Yup, this is an ancient thread, but very helpful. I had to give up the pond eventually as we were starting a new house build and that summer the (really old) liner developed some big cracks due to age. Gave my two humongous koi to a local pond supply place and removed the pond. I figure the house will sell easier without something future owners may look at and think "high maintenance" (not that they're wrong, but...) and I want to ditch the old house fast when the time comes. I write this post simply to say to new pond builders: When you buy a pond liner, get a REALLY GOOD UV PROTECTED one that is mostly thick rubber, not plastic. I thought mine was thick enough but after 12 years or so, it started to wear out due to sun, get brittle and just start having problems. You drop a rock? Oops, hole! Now the pond area is just a plant area and all I have are memories of better pond days. I'll have a pond at the new place after things settle down and thanks to many posters here for all the info to help keep the water clear when that time comes!

Okay, once I made my pond substantially larger last year I had the obligatory algae bloom and then Clear Clear water. That was until I had an early autumn here in the midwest and a maple tree filled my pond with leaves (prior to me netting the pond). Since that time I've only had tea-colored water (!!!), and it has confounded me! I've cleared the leaves from the pond long ago but I still have tea colored water, it is now almost June of the following year. The Professor has pointed out that a nearby mulched garden bed could be fouling my water. It's a long shot but maybe. I'm working on curing that now by introducing a larger rock-lined edge around the pond. But I'm interested in some things that Sandy has said in another post about anerobic bacteria / die off of good bacteria / sulphur smell and lack of oxygen. It has made me think of this above posting by Watershaper talking about flocculent (sp)-- I think I know what this (flocculent) is but I'll have to do more research-- and activated carbon, as well as oxygenation. My setup is a 2800 gal pond focusing on aquatic plants, I have about 8 large marginals, and 8 hardy water lilies. I have a large Savio skimmer and an Atlantic Bio-Falls. The plants in the bio-falls are starting to root now. The other plants are doing so-so; larger ones have gotten fertilized with Highland Rim tabs for the first time this spring ( I didn't do this last year), but smaller plants seem to struggle. Of my overall 2800 gals most of this is in the lower pool, where I have the water lilies. The depth is about 34 inches with several shelves. I have a wide but short height falls between the upper and lower pools, only about six inches of falls by 40 inches wide (weir). The upper pool is approximately 200 gals. This is where I've put most of the marginals, the depth is only about 18 inches (deepest) with about 12" the norm. I have everything in pots in sandy-clay soil with pebbles or sand tops. I have the bio-falls up stream from the upper pool and about a five foot quick descending stream between them. It is lined with rounded cobbles. I have been fighting string algae all winter and spring. Again, I've been fighting STRING ALGAE ALL WINTER & SPRING! While I've gotten a hold of it in the lower (larger) pool, the stuff is still forming anew in the upper pool around the plants and rocks of the stream... this is coming right off the bio-falls! I haven't been able to figure this out. Why would the water coming off the vegetative filtration be the most prone to develop the algae?! I'VE ADDED SOME HYDROGEN PEROXIDE TO THE MORE STILL WATERS AND IT SEEMS TO KILL THE ALGAE, AT LEAST IT CLUMPS AND I CAN SCOOP IT OUT IN A DAY OR TWO. But why would my bio-falls and stream bed coming off the falls be so prone to algae just when the vegetative filter is starting to really grow? This should be the exact opposite, should it not! :( Next, I actually have two pumps in my Savio skimmer basin. One I have going to the Bio-Falls and the other I have going to a pipe with cut out holes that discharges just under the weir of the bio-falls to create a rapids effect. Both pumps are Laguna 3500 gph (I would estimate a 12 foot head, so they what, discharge about like a 2800 gph pump). Okay, so that's the setup. A few fish, 12 to 15. Mainly Fancy Goldfish of medium size, less than four inches. I test the water chemistry almost weekly. Here it is, without fail: pH: 8.5 ( I no longer try adjusting pH down ) KH: 9.25 degrees or 166ppm ( I buffer with Baking Soda as needed) GH: 3 to 5 degrees Nitrite: Nitrate: (hard to read the scale but no more than this) CO2: (not sure if the chart the Tetra Pond Test Kit gives is good for ponds because it says for aquariums on the CO2 sheet, but given the pH and KH it would be 0.8mg/lf Water Temp.: fluctuating this spring between 64 F and 73 F. The above results were from yesterday (almost any day) at 73 F in the late afternoon. So... Okay, I've had the "rapids-creating pump" off for a few days just to save electricity dollars. But I turn it on today after a good 2 weeks off. I get a huge plum of fine muck like sediment discharged thru my rapids pipe and into my stream & upper pool and there is a very strong sulphur smell that lingers for about 4 or 5 minutes, it makes me think of Sandy's previous post about anerobic bacteria creating the smell and killing the beneficial bacteria. Would this account for why my bio-falls is not "eating-up" my excess nutrients that cause my string algae (occurring IN and close to the falls)??? I have a lot of fine sediment on the bottom of my pond. It is only about quarter of an inch deep sediment but it seems to be stirred-up quickly by any kind of movement. Is this causing my water to be tea-colored? It's so fine. If I move the net into the lily pool to remove string algae I get a cloud of fine, brown debris. I believe this is what my second pump, when I turned it on for the rapids, sucked up the pipe to the cloud and stink-up (sulphur) my stream bed. So Watershaper says use a flocculent. I haven't goggled "flocculant" yet but I imagine it is something to bind particulate together. Okay. Might work. He also says add "activated carbon" which I believe is a form of charcoal. Where do you get this? I mean besides the pond store that sells it like gold? What else am I missing? Professor? Oh I know, I want to ask about Oxygen that's dispersed in the water. I believe the pond gets an oxygen boost from three sources in my pools. First I have the falls from the vegetative bio-filter, this is the Atlantic Bio-Falls; then I get oxygen (I think) from the rapids of the steep stream; then, I believe I get oxygen from the 6 inch falls located between the small upper pool and lily pond pool. My question is this: how does oxygen travel in a larger pool of water? If my lower pool is roughly 2400 gal. and all of the turbulence is on the west side, is the far east side of that lower pool being oxygentated? I wonder. Sandy indicated that she cleared water by adding a bubbler to smaller pools. Can it be that with one or two 2800 to 3500 gph pumps in this roughly 3000 gal pond that I'm still not getting enough oxygen to make things balance??? What you say?

Hello nanner, I thought I'd post a bit about what's been going on around here the last few years. I wish I could say the stone house is done, but it isn't. (I feel very silly about the fact it's not done. We had every good intention of finishing it and we have laid more stonework every year, but other stuff keeps getting in the way, namely, life!) We got involved with finishing and remodeling the quarry garden and a whole bunch of other stuff, like moving the little 'barn' again (for the 4th and final time--at least, that's what we told our son, who wasn't amused!) Last fall, our furnace gave out, so we installed geothermal which meant we had to tear up the entire west side of our yard (about a half acre) and saw down trees, dig up hundreds of hostas and perennials and relocate as many as possible. The bright side of this was the opportunity to change the entire landscape of the front of the house, AND to get more rocks! Our 'digger guy' "C" is still around, too, and he was instrumental in the geothermal excavation and in loading another 130 tons from the local quarry for us. We had "C" make a berm close to the house and that's where we started the new rock garden. We're not sure if it fits in the landscaping or not, and we jokingly refer to it as 'the elephant burial mound' which is kind of self-explanatory. :-) The first pic shows one of the four trenches: Below is a picture of Carl & I after two of the six loads of rocks were delivered. By December 2009, this was as far as we got on the Elephant Burial Mound: I have to take more updated pictures of this garden, especially after the dwarf conifers and flowers are planted. I started a blog about the garden with lots of pictures and all the other goofy stuff that goes on around here which goes into much more detail, if you're interested, the address is: http://krensgarden-karen.blogspot.com/

Hi Jane, the upper smaller pond is called a bog and it's purpose is to clean your water and offer a naturalized setting. This is a good thing that someone planned that feature. Your iris as with most of the water iris can be on the aggressive side. I divided mine with a saw a year ago. You wouldn't know that today though. I have Gamecock and Yellow flag. Yellow flag are super water cleaners. My gamecock has never bloomed but I do feed them with the approved pond tabs so as to not upset the overall environment. Personally, I would wait to divide as you could still get some cold snaps and they might be too stressed to handle the cold under those conditions. Placing them in a water garden plastic container/basket would make the job of dividing in the future much easier. There are many bog type plants to choose from. I love parrot feathers. They like to float on top and koi like to eat them so it is better the two don't meet. In regards to water: You might check to see if there is a koi club nearby or a garden center with knowledge about water gardens and koi. Of course the internet is full of information and it can be like the wild, wild west. You will run into many differences of opinions. I ran into that and it was very disheartening and totally confusing. In the end, it's up to you to do homework on water chemistry and how best to maintain your pond. I only say this because of experience and I hope you understand. I would gladly tell you what works for me but our ponds and environments are very different. Sad experience tells me that stuff happens on Saturday nights when there are no stores open to get emergency supplies so now I have those things, just in case. At minimum, you should know how to test your water. The good news is your pond is established meaning you have all those beneficial bacteria working for you. That can take months to get going. The first year of a pond can be an adventure :( Barring an ammonia spike, the bacteria should be able to handle the majority of work. Prior owners said to just add water occasionally. That probably would be okay because of your total volume. Doing the whole chlorine removal probably isn't necessary unless you are changing out thousands of gallons. A couple of hundred gallons added to what you already have will dilute it enough, I would think. Looking to the immediate future, spring is coming which will mean a food change. Water warms up, bacteria get more active. I would imagine the number one mistake people make is overfeeding. When the water temp. is low, you might not feed at all. The fish's metabolism slows down and food won't process. Koi can live in iced over conditions with a small vent hole for gasses to escape. They can do this for a long time so don't feel you are torturing them. But then spring comes and they are hungry and you need to be careful with the type and quantity of food because they will make a lot of waste and your bio filter needs to warm up in order to process waste. Are your Koi more cigar shaped (male) or rounder (female)? Spawning season is coming and that affects water quality too. Finally, think long and hard about adding more fish until you feel really confident in your maintenance routine. You probably will have to muck out the debris on the bottom, old leaves and such. Does this pond have a liner? Cleaning it out is messy and exhausting. Your filter will need to be cleaned or backwashed and you should check all your equipment for wear and tear. Pumps do wear out mostly when you least expect it. Hopefully they left you some notes on the how, what, where for reference. Did the prior owners take care of this themselves or hire a service? I hope this helps a little. Have a great day!