Starting my first pondless waterfall - am I on the right track?

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I saw your post on another forum, which reminded me that I wanted to address one more issue - you said you would only turn the falls on intermittently. We have our pondless on a timer which turns off every night for 6 hours. I don't think you want to leave water standing in your reservoir for much longer than that. Standing water is known for several things - stagnation, which smells and breeding grounds for mosquitos... even under rocks. We had a garbage can filled with gravel that got rain water in it and the mosquitos were breeding in it under the gravel. So keeping that water moving on a regular basis is important.

Your milk crate idea is creative and I can't really think of a downside. Although you might find pulling them out is more of a pain than you might think. Our reservoir has a vault inside it that houses the pump so we only need to pull the lid off the vault to take the pump out. You would have to remove all your rocks every time you need to access the pump to keep them from falling in, right? I guess if you used larger rocks that might not be a big issue, but most pondless systems have smaller rocks or even gravel to give you that disappearing water look. And a milk crate might have holes that were too large - smaller rocks may fall in. Not the biggest deal, but something to consider when choosing your rocks for the basin.

Also remember that your construction needs to take into consideration the stream depth required to hold the volume of water you intend to have flowing. Sides that are too shallow will create constant water loss and frustration.

Just some things to think about.
 
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Thanks Lisa. Yes - having the standing water around is another concern I have. I was wondering if there were any treatments I could keep in the water that will basically just kill anything or stop any life from forming in the water. I won't have any plants or fish - but I would want something that wouldn't harm birds that may stop by, or my kids if they stick their hands in. I read that a few spoonfuls of bleach could do the trick. Or mosquito dunks for the mosquito larvae? Most of the time, the water will be underground, in the dark, so maybe algae wouldn't be a problem? I may put it on a timer so that at least it runs for a few hours a day.
 

sissy

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600 dollar pump what is it made of gold /Look at energy cost to run the pump also that is why I went with laguna pumps .
 
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Here's a small update. I finished excavating the resrvoir area but I'm still not sure if it's big enough or not. I think I'm going to go ahead and give it a try anyway. I found a website where you put in the waterfall dimensions and it estimates the amount of water needed - and this seemed to be enough, but I won't really know until I try it. As it is, I'm at around 25 gallons of volume.

Also, for the milk crates, I decided I will keep one right side up, to keep the pump in, and cover it with some sort of plastic, etc. This way, if I need to access the pump, I only need to remove that section of the covering.

On a positive note, a tons of rocks, some quite nice, came out of my excavation area, so those will get used on the waterfall. I especially like the big flat one leaning against the fence. Any ideas of where to place that one? I can't decide if it should go on one of the sides, for support and cover, or if maybe it should stay flat and be a little pool area, on the lowest level before it empties back into the ground.

i-Sj9jRmv-2031x1142.jpg
 

addy1

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Welcome to our group! That will look nice when you are done
 
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Hey guys - been a while since I updated this thread. Today I did my first test run of the waterfall - and it worked! The only thing is, I'm thinking I may have gotten too big a pump. Went with the 1300gph. It's producing a bit too much sound I think. When I lay all the rocks in place, I'm imaging it will tone down a bit, but I may switch it for a smaller pump. Let me know what you guys think of this.

i-PFw2fNk-2031x1142.jpg



Here's a link to the video, not sure if it will work:

http://api.smugmug.com/services/emb...&height=360&albumId=40481827&albumKey=Z6bfNV"
 

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