bump

I would and did. Have used one for a couple years and I don't know how to live without it now. On another forum a poll was recently conducted and the most common response was "I love mine", including my own.

Oops, actually that was the wrong pic. That's a close up of the filter and waterfall return. The filter is at the back, it's a 260 liter reservoir sitting in a lined "pit" with raised sides. The reservoir is partially sunk into the ground so I didn't need to make the sides of the pit too high, or use too much rockery to hide it. I wouldn't really call it a top pond, it's not that big... The "bridge" is just a home-made bench because there is no other way to access the filter and stuff without falling in - it goes right up to the hedge. The white thing in the middle of the filter reservoir is a right-angle pipe joint where the water from th epump is directed to the bottom of the filter - where it then upflows through all the pan scrubbers and fake alphagrog layers. A black right angle joint would have been better, but I couldn't find one. Never mind - in the top of the reservoir watercress is growing nicely (to eat nutrients before they can feed algae in the pond) and should hide the joint it eventually. You can see an aluminium tube sticking out of the joint, which is my home made venturi to make sure the filter bacteria get plenty of oxygen. The filtered water overflows the reservoir into the lined pit (which also has some barley straw decomposing nicely in it), then it flows into another reservoir with pickeral weed, golden sedge, marsh marigold and water forget-me-not growing in it... then it flows back into the pond via the shallow waterfall. Lots of "dwell time" in each reservoir section, and the water doesn't flow that fast, so suspended material settles out quite nicely. I couldn't use a fast flowing or high waterfall, because the noise of it at night in Summer would be enough to annoy the neighbours trying to sleep with their windows open. So far the filter has been working really well, the water is crystal clear, but the real test will be next Spring/Summer when the weather gets warm again and I'll see how well it controls algae blooms...

Thanks SandyN! And Linda/Clive, a lot of the pond plants are 2 or 3 years old now eg. some of the lillies... so yes, some are quite mature. But some of it was bought this year and is also thriving. I've decided not to over-Winter anything this year, I'll just see what survives - and replace anything that doesn't in Spring - with more hardy plants. The edging is not bamboo, it's willow or something - a nearby Wilkinson's was selling rolls of it really cheap so I snapped it up. It had a "wavy" top edge, but I just sawed the ends off while it was still rolled up, to get a straightish edge and make it the right height. Next year, I'm planning to add a decking area opposite the waterfall, for pond-side relaxing... and a bridge across the middle to provide a more interesting place to do my pond-watching and also provide more shade. More shade = less algae, I was hoping for good surface coverage by duckweed - and azolla thanks to Sean - but they never really get going because the fish love eating it :-P)