Hello from Dallas Texas

[smack a yak]

Hi all i have been looking for a good pond forum to be able to talk and learn about pond stuff. My wife and I just bought are first house and its really awesome. The previous owners had a very large pond installed witch is one of the reasons we decided on this house. I personally have very little pond experience but i grew up with all kinds of fish and had a couple of large tanks but nothing like this. So far it seems to have been a lot of trouble but i am loving it the ex owners kind of let it go when they were moving out and so i have been trying to get it back to being perfect again. I have a mix of regular and butterfly koi and a bunch of little guys the eat mosquito's, that the owners left. I look forward to talking to yall and getting to know yall and more about ponds.

 

[sissy]

wow welcome that is one nice looking pond you got and your extra it came with a house .CONGRATS .I am jealous .more pics and hope the other owner left you info .How deep and how big .ROCK ENVY ALSO

 

[sissy]

you must be near our lou

 

[smack a yak]

They left me with little to no info really i have been reading lots of stuff on the internet to figure most things out

 

[j.w]

smack a yak
Very pretty pond you have there. How big is your pond? Do you know what kind of filter, pond pump and other accessories that you have? A water test kit would be nice for you to have to make sure things are right. I don't have koi just goldfish but lots here have koi and can help you w/ their specific needs. Glad you joined

 

[sissy]

you tube can give you some info and what kind of fish are in there and can you tell if there are a lot .Is the pond clean .Plants you have in there look like there doing a good job of cleaning .The bottom may need netted to get leaves out but you will have to be very careful not to disturb things to much .What is the filter like and what kind of pump and can you see how much GPH the pump has and is it external or submerged .We use a pool net,LOL we thought the same JW

 

[j.w]

Hee hee, sissy! Hey SAY (short for smack a yak) :razz: you mentioned you were having a lot of problems. Can you tell us each and every one of them and we will try and help get you on the road to easy peezy relaxing by your pond instead of nightmare on pond street :goodnight:

 

[sissy]

looking at the pond it really looks like some one knew what they were doing .The plants really look great .I see some elephant ears and those papyrus are nice looking .I think I see blue grass and some nice looking lilies

 

[smack a yak]

well the pond is about 6000+ gallons and since its winter ish and i say that because this is texas and every other day is hot and then the next its cold, the plants are all hibernating or dead i dont know yet... and the bottom of the pond seems to be filling with muck and crap. String algae is growing like crazy like it went from not there to me having to pull out bunches from the side everyday. i have a water test kit everything is great except my PH i cant get it to go down and i dont want to use any chemicals the PH is currently about 8.2 . when i got the pond it had a 1200 gph filter from lowes with a 1200gph pump and a 500gph box filter at the bottom with a 500gph pump and that was it, the water fall is ran by a 3600 gph pump and just had filter media in the top skimmer and thats what they called a filter. Since we have been here i have added two filters i found these Grech cpf-10000 filters on ebay for like 140$ and they can do up to 5000gph. I added one of the filters to the line for the water fall and i just got the other one a week ago i also got another 2 pumps i got a 4200gph bottom dome pump that i put in there to run the second filter and i got a 5200gph to replace the 3600gph so i could have a stronger water fall... i havent installed this one yet. the water is super clear and the fish are doing great i think that i am mostly paranoid about the ph being a little high. the picture that i have of the pond was when we first moved in we have been here for about 5 months so alot has changed mostly because of the change in seasons ill see if i can get more pics of it currently. I took all the plants out to clean them off cause it seemed like they were just harboring algae i havent gotten all of them back in yet.and alot of my lillys have died or been taken over by algae is this normal for winter... since the new filter there has been alot less algae both the filters have 18w uv lights and i think thats one of the reasons it has gotten better. Also i have a bunch of big rocks and boulders under water and was told at a pond store to take them out but i like them and feel like it makes it look more natural do yall have rocks and stuff in your pond and do yall have problems with build up of muck and plant debris
sorry i have so much to say thanks for all the greetings and compliments

 

[Mmathis]

Welcome!

 

[smack a yak]

 

[sissy]

8 .2 is normal that is not high and muck on the bottom disturbed to much may cause more problems only do a tiny bit at a time .Muck the tadpoles and fish love to eat so don't feed them and see what happens

 

[smack a yak]

 

[smack a yak]

 

[smack a yak]

these are all photos i have i can take more if yall want to see anything more closely