Second Pond Ideas

[ed2]

Hi guys,

I recently completed my new gravel bio/veggie filter project and now, after perhaps surprising myself with the DIY handywork of my father and I, I have decided that I really want to build a new pond. I've dreamt up a design and everything.

As I've mentioned before, we have a bridge over my current pond that leads to a large decking patio. The thing is, in 2011 we converted our shed that was joined to the back of our house into a large dining room, and added two patio doors out onto a slabbed patio area with outdoor dining table, outdoor seating area and a built in brick barbecue and clay pizza oven. This means that the patio is now completely unused, apart from for a washing line.

The decking area is approximately 4 metres x 10 metres. What I really want to do is to take up the decking boards (trying not to be bitten by one of the resident snakes). I would then cut away the decking supports and refit them to allow a square hole to be dug in the middle, approximately 7 metres x 3 metres. What I would then like to do is dig down approximately 2-3 feets, and build in some foundations.

I would then intend to build a square wall which would have two sections - one 7m x 1m, and the other section 7m x 2m. I would fit 2 bottom drains and a surface skimmer, which would be run with an inline pump (housed at the rear of the pond in a pump house) and this would then pump the dirty water into the bottom of the gravel/bio filter section (the 7mx1m brick section). The water would rise through the gravel bio filter (with a sump to drain waste regularly) and then would poor into the pond (the 7mx2m brick section running parallel to the filter). I would raise the rear and sides of the 7mx1m filter up, so that the pond side formed several nice overflows into the pond (like the stainless steel waterfall/waterfeatures with water troughs). The top of the gravel filter will have about 6 inches free water with loads of nice water plants - reeds, mint, hyacinth, etc etc.

Does this sound like a feasible design? Can you seal brickwork or do you have to put a liner in? What products are recommended to do this? And has anybody built any ponds of a similar design?


Many thanks in anticipation.

Ps. This isn't anything that will happen anytime soon - it will probably be planned, and then I will acquire as much of the kit as possible through summer (as and when I get some disposable income, which is like rocking horse poo given I'm a student!) and start the project in autumn, in order to concentrate on cycling the pond over the winter and ready to stock in spring 2013! By which time I'll hopefully have persuaded one of the ambulance services to recruit me and will have a bit of money to invest in stocking it!


Regards,

Ed

 

[addy1]

i would think you would need to seal the brick work, put in a liner or use some of that spray stuff, which can run to some big bucks. (I would put in a liner) I like the sounds of the rest of your project. My bog/gravel/plant filter keeps my pond in great shape.

 

[Waterbug]

Seems like a good design to me.

I personally like submerged pumps rather than external especially if close to a patio. I know a lot of people like to say they can't hear them, or it doesn't bother them, but on a calm quiet evening my wife would turn to me and ask "what's that hum". Kind of ruins the whole pretend nature thing for me.

You didn't mention TPRs (tangential pond returns). Critical for bottom drains to work well. Unless you're getting drains with built in air diffuser. I'm not a fan of air diffuser in the middle of ponds and especially in smaller ponds. Can't see the fish.

Running a skimmer and bottom drain off the same pump is difficult. One will pull more than the other, one may not pull hardly at all. Tweaking means adding ball valves, and pulling leaves, string algae and stuff thru a half closed valve could mean clogs.

Not sure if both bottom drains are in the pond, or one is in the filter. 2 bottom drains in the pond and a skimmer all connected to a single pump...pretty much impossible to balance the flow in 3 inputs. Connecting 2 drains to a single pump is difficult too. A better way imo is to have the bottom drains gravity feed into something like a sieve filter and then pump that water up to your gravel filter. Easy to balance the bottom drains that way. Fewer clogs. You're not grinding up stuff.

Then a separate pump for the skimmer, which could be on a timer and only run sometimes if you like.

Gravel filters aren't that great for flushing. A lot of crap will come out, but a lot will stay trapped in the gravel. Better to remove crap before it gets into the gravel imo. Or, if that can't be done I'd suggest using the bottom drains to flush the pond instead rather than running the drains 24/7 since you wouldn't be gaining anything.

Crap is decomposing in the gravel filter or the bottom of the pond has the same effect on water quality. But you'll remove more crap flushing the pond rather than the gravel filter, at least most of the time.

 

[addy1]

And I like external vs submerged, to me easier to take care of. I can't even hear a hum from mine even standing right next to it. the evolution one is very quiet.

 

[sissy]

I guess it depends on the pump and hate to say this but pumps made these days may be more energy efficient but seem to not be made quite as well .I guess though that is that way with stuff these days ,make it cheap and not to last so they have to buy another one soon.Even air pumps can drive you nuts with there noise no matter how hard you try to stop the noise .Sometimes i can feel mine vibrate through the concrete pad more than i can hear it .

 

[Waterbug]

Yeah, it's a taste thing. I personally like the hum, I like to hear the pond working away because I kind of know what's going on behind the scene. What I never liked is when others were viewing a pond and asked what the noise was. I'm not sure it irritated them or not, I just didn't like the hum of a pump to be the thing they noticed. After you go to all that work and expense to make something look and sound soothing and peaceful and get "what's that noise?" kicks me in the gut.

In high end, high flow ponds an external is really needed and so you go to lengths to hide the sound. But if it wasn't a requirement I'd never put an external into someone else's pond because I didn't want to be showing off my work and get "what's that noise".

If you do go external I suggest at least plumbing the bulk head so there's a pipe nub (nipple) thru the bulkhead and into the pond. That way if the noise bothers you it isn't so hard to switch. With a flush bulkhead it can be a real pain.

But if I were building a pond for Addy I'd put in an external.

 

[taherrmann4]

People usually get an external that need or want the gph that they produce and if you are pumping this much water it creates quite waterfall which drowns out any hum noise you might hear. My external is quiet and yes there is a slight hum but you can 't hear it over the waterfall. The only time you can hear it is if you lift the roof off of the pump house and are standing over it. If you plan out where you are going to put everything you can be quite strategic and put the pump someplace away from any seating areas in your yard. If it close to your waterfall you will never hear it. I can only speak about the sequence pump as this is what I have.

 

[addy1]

My dragon pumps are very quiet also. Still waiting on my arizona renters to send them to me.

 

[j.w]

I think you need to kick those renters in the butt addy to get them moving,lol!

 

[addy1]

I think you need to kick those renters in the butt addy to get them moving,lol!

They pay on time, take care of anything broken.............so trying real hard to be patient.

 

[ed2]

Thanks for all of the advice so far! The one thing I've decided from this is that I want to do a lot of research. My current pond has taken so much effort and money because I didn't get things right the first time. Now, I'd love to get started but when I start work in September (4 days on, 4 days off) I will hopefully have both the cash and time to do things right!

I have been thinking that I could gravity feed from two drains with slow restrictions into a series of filters with a seive, a Venturi, then maybe even a bakki shower, and then use a pump to pump the filtered water into the bottom of the said gravel bio and veggie filter! Ohhh the possibilities! I will keep researching! The way I see it, waiting to do it properly rather than rushing it on the cheap will give me time to get things right and to get a great design together! I think I'm finally getting my head around keeping water, with the fish as a bonus

Thanks,

Ed

 

[ed2]

Right, I've been thinking about the way this would work and I've come up with a possible solution for my filtration system... opinions please?

So, I would have the two sections to the pond, one for the pond itself and one running parallel behind it, which will be a gravel bed for bio filtration and lots of plants, which will be around a foot higher, and will have a waterfall almost the whole length of it back into the pond.

The idea:

I would have the water falling from the gravel filter into the pond. Now, instead of having a skimmer on the pond, I am thinking (and bare with me please as this might be a mad/illogical idea!) of having two waterfalls, one at either end of the pond, which will of course 'skim' the leaves/debris off the water surface. These would fall vertically on both sides into seperate bakki showers, which will also both have a very fine mesh sieve beneath them. The water would then fall into two seperate tanks that are below the decking, and will then be pumped through a UV steriliser and back into either end of the gravel bed at the base, where it will rise back through the gravel bed, plants and then back into the pond.

My logic is that the two hidden tanks would never dry out, as it would only feed as much water through the overflow as is pumped back into the pond. It would also hopefully make an attractive water feature too!

The one that is really throwing me is how you run a bottom drain through a filter system without the water inflow being either more or less than the water being pumped back out again? Could somebody explain this to me please??


Many thanks,


Ed

 

[Waterbug]

That is basically how I like to set up a pond if the yard allows. However I switch the positions of bog and filters.Filters highest, then pond and bog is lowest.

Reservoir
The reason is because the lowest tank is the reservoir. When you turn on the pump it will take maybe a minute or two for water to make its way back to the lowest tank, so the lowest tank will be drawn down by 50, 100, 200 gals depending on many factors. A good size bog has no problem holding that much reserve. If you use filters as the reservoir it's an added expensive only needed to hold water when the pump starts or stops. When stopped the opposite happens, the bottom tank keeps filling after the pump is off. Again for a bog it's no problem.

The other way the bottom tank acts as a reservoir is all evaporation shows up in that bottom tank. The bottom tank is the only place you can put the auto fill valve, can't be a bio filter, too much chlorinated water, so you really need a separate tank just for the auto fill. Again, added expense in both cash, time and space. For example, a 15x15 pond that loses say 1/2" to evaporation per day would draw down the lowest tank by 70 gals. No big deal in a bog.

Gravity fed skimmer and BD using one pump...
To gravity feed both a skimmer overflow and BD you tweak the height of the BD out flow pipe. For example, if you built a 6' wide skimmer overflow (silly, but just as an example) you would have the thinnest amount of water going over the top. Not a lot of play. Now the other extreme, say the skimmer is 1" wide. You'd have maybe 10" of water going over the skimmer top. In that case the BD outflow could be anywhere inside that 10" range and some water would flow over the skimmer and some through the BD. The height of the BD outflow would control how much. Say the BD was positioned 5" above the skimmer top...you'd have about 1/2 the water going through each. 2" above the skimmer and 80% of the water would go through the BD.

Skimmer overflow construction...
What I do is make the skimmer overflow wider than I estimate is needed. I mortar over the liner, so the bare liner opening is even a little wider. Later I can add additional rock and mortar to reduce to the width to be exactly like I want it.

Unless you're using a huge pump the skimmer width is surprising narrow, in the 3-4" range normally. In most ponds that could be a big problem as the entrance could cog. But in your setup the BD would just flow more so no harm.

 

[Waterbug]

Still no mention of TPRs...that'll be a bummer.

 

[ed2]

Wow I have a lot to learn before I can actually get this in my head correctly as I am very new to complex filtration design. I might have to seek assistance with the design from somewhere as a lot of what you advise is quite a lot to get my developing brain around! But it does seem like I am somewhere near ok!!

Thanks for the advice again!

Ed