Actually, a pond should not just be topped off, but rather water changes should be done on a weekly basis. 10% or more is best. I dump the water from my settling chambers several times a week and the plants love it!! Free fertilizer. Then I top off the pond with new water. It is healthier for the fish. Water changes remove heavy metals and other toxins that accumulate in ponds.

Hi we had 2 small pondds in hour garden 'made by last tenent' So we decided to take that out and make a big one 2meters by 1meter, depth half a meter, we have a small water fall and fountain with plants, we put fish in was looking good, Then disaster the wather started to go down so we 'topped it up'' the fish started to die 1 sometimes 2 at a time, water still leaking, By this time most of the fish had gone, so we drained the water 'put remaining fish in a tank' we got another pond liner ;deciding to put the old one on the bottem for extra layer, got new liner in situ, filled with water put in plants left it for a week got the water checked to make sure we could get more fish, so far so good, we were really pleased to beable to then add fish we got 2 to start off see how they went on, Yes they are doing really well so hoped to ge some more in this weekend, BUT alas where is the water going !!!!! you guessed it went out monday morning about 1 inch of water gone, topped it up with rain water out of the Butt fine come Teusday water still gone down *fish still looking ok* Surely we said not another leak... if so this pond could end up becoming a rose garden, MY question is why would i be loosing water yet again other than another leak, Please answer this for me . Gerry (felale)

Responses are in your other post at http://forums.gardenweb.com/forums/load/tomato/msg0814470912867.html?3 Here is a link that might be useful: your other, but same conetnt, post

Gardenchick, I just put a hose on that valve on the pump, and then stick the other end out in the drain in the street... it's not too difficult, I just wondered if other people had to do it. Arbisi, this is really good to know about the creepy crawly & the SWG -- we have a Diamond Brite finish and we're supposed to be letting it cure for the first 28 days, so we haven't put the salt in yet or used the Hayward Navigator... but when we do, I can totally see why we then wouldn't want to let water out... GK5040, I can't believe you haven't been getting these rains. It seems like the last few weeks it storms all the time in Central Fla... :( Hope some comes your way soon.