Bog filter and additional filter

Joined
Jun 9, 2021
Messages
41
Reaction score
19
Country
United Kingdom
Having built my new pond last year and bog filter which is flourishing, is it recommended to add additional filtration in form of a pressure filter or similar?
Reason I ask is the bog is keeping the pond clear to a fashion but I’m thinking on adding more filtration. I’ve probably got too many Koi in there to be honest, 2300 gallon and about 12 koi.
Anybody else running similar?
Chris ( United Kingdom)
 
Joined
Jun 9, 2021
Messages
41
Reaction score
19
Country
United Kingdom
More filtration never hurts, but what is making you want more? Are you testing your water?
I am testing. I’ve lined the pond with rocks and pebbles on the bottom which I know some people are not keen on. However, I’m not keen on the thought of detritus in them stones so though some extra filtration will help. My water chemistry is good apart from Phosphate which is a little high but our tap water is similar!
My bog is also run over by common monkey flower and I would like to get shot of that and plant some different plants so any recommendations are welcome.
I recently lost a relatively new golden koi with ulcers on it and not sure why that happened so I’m keeping a close eye on it!
 
Joined
Sep 18, 2020
Messages
3,256
Reaction score
3,528
Location
Pacific NW
Hardiness Zone
8b
Country
United States
Cool. I’m not an expert on fish/water quality, but I can tell you that a pressure filter won’t do anything for detritus/muck build up. That is handled by skimming/mechanical filtration.
 
Joined
Oct 28, 2013
Messages
13,359
Reaction score
13,784
Location
Northern IL
Showcase(s):
1
I am concerned that you have too many fish for your size pond. Koi grow quickly and if your pond is undersized, you will hit a tipping point... from "everything is great!" to "my fish are all dying!" literally overnight. The first thing I would suggest is to re-home some fish.... or all of them. With a pond that size you could have dozens of goldfish, or a small handful of big koi. Naturally the choice is yours, but if you don't choose, I fear nature will choose for you. Now on to your real question...

We've had a bog filter on our pond since day one, and it's done great to keep the water healthy and the fish happy. However, we did start to notice an increase in the amount of tiny floating debris in the pond. (We don't have a skimmer and didn't have a biofalls) so essentially we had great biological filtration but inadequate mechanical filtration. We could catch the big debris, but the tiny stuff just kept going round and round.

Two years ago we bought a simple box filter with four filter pads and a pump - didn't look pretty sitting next to the pond, but made a HUGE difference in the amount of floating debris. We needed a rebuild on our waterfall, so we talked to our pond builder about the issue we had with floating debris and he suggested adding a biofalls - not for the biological filtration, but to have a place to add filter pads to catch the tiny stuff. About 2/3 of the water now pumps through the bog and 1/3 runs through the biofalls. Perfect solution for our situation.

So long story short, while I'm a big bog fan, in our case I think we don't have enough settlement time in our bog for the fine debris to settle to the bottom. Adding a biofalls solved that issue for us.
 
Joined
Sep 18, 2020
Messages
3,256
Reaction score
3,528
Location
Pacific NW
Hardiness Zone
8b
Country
United States
@Lisak1: I bet simply splitting the flow between two outlets also played a role in your solution, as that would slow down the flow through the bog by 1/3, which would allow a lot more time for settling.
 
Joined
Dec 16, 2017
Messages
14,437
Reaction score
11,426
Location
Ct
Showcase(s):
1
Hardiness Zone
6b
Country
United States
While my water is crystal clear from the bogs, and wanting the best water quality . i am entertaining the idea of a Sieve or a RDF while the rdf does it all on its own it has moving parts a sensors . while the sieve Is as basic as you can get , water pours onto a micron filter screen and the water passes through but not any debris to 300 microns. i'm leaning toward a dyi Sieve. I am concerned about debris building up in the cistern and if i had the sieve empty in the entrance of the cistern it would remove all debris from entering and setting in the cistern.
This would kill two birds with one stone so it will probably be happening in the near future.
 
Last edited:

Ask a Question

Want to reply to this thread or ask your own question?

You'll need to choose a username for the site, which only take a couple of moments. After that, you can post your question and our members will help you out.

Ask a Question

Members online

Forum statistics

Threads
31,508
Messages
518,000
Members
13,715
Latest member
badgerboy

Latest Threads

Top