Here we go...

[koiguy1969]

no i dont use a skimmer..in the mornings while i'm out there enjoying a cup of joe by the pond, i take the "minute" it takes to hand skim mine with a net....thats not to say skimmers dont have their purpose and many people use them. i didnt want the added expense of buying one. DIY versions are easily made tho...i just didnt see the need for one. or the additional plumbing.
*** for making any holes needed, for a filter build,a hole saw is easiest, no doubt, but i used a heat gun and a utility knife with a fresh blade... a submersable pump can save alot of plumbing work...my pump sits on a ledge just to the right 'under my falls'....it feeds my filter with about 3' of hose (run between and under the rocks) and only has about 1' of head......the input of the pump is plumbed to the other side of the pond with 1&1/4" flexible hose running around the bottom edge of the pond, on its floor. its black and disappears in the pond as well, between lilly pots etc... if there should ever be a leak in the hoses or connections there almost all "in pond" and likely of little consequence.

 

[addy1]

Some submersibles are housed in a skimmer, some are on the bottom of the pond, you usually need to put a crate or some sort of filtration around it to keep from sucking in the small fish and debris.

 

[sissy]

But remember also that most submersilbles come with a plastic housing with fine slits in it and have a foam filter which i never use gets to clogged up .I do wire mine on top of a crate ,but I am going to change over to the new lowes pump as it has internal low water switch in it .I guess all pumps have pro's and cons and comes down to how much you want to spend and what features you are looking for .Just like anything they are improving on stuff .Energy costs at the top and then safety features and noise reduction .So mostly cost will be a determining factor .I will always have 2 pumps in my pond just in case .

 

[koiguy1969]

It's true most submersables have a housing over their input,( some with a simple flow control knob) but those housings are removable and with most you can leave them off, and put a hose adapter and hose on the input.... i have 5 pumps all with the covers and i have run input hoses on all. the little pieces of foam prefilters in the housings are more of a pain than a gain.....i run external large prefilters.

 

[Waterbug]

My DIY skimmer. I put the pump to the left of the basket in the skimmer box. After I sold that house the new owners moved the pump to the bottom of the pond, raccoons pulled out a hose, pump drained the pond and all the fish died. I like the pump up high.

No way to tell if the tank filter is over kill or not enough. You measure ammonia to tell that. In most Water Gardens measure zero ammonia with no filter so if I had to place a wager I'd bet over kill. There are easier, cheaper, and much more efficient bio filters such as Trickle filter, Trickle Tower, Shower filter. Google will point you to lots. The only difference is the trickle filters get the media up out of the water, so more O2 and it washes the media and keeps it clean so the bacteria aren't killed. Most trickle filters you see online are for heavy fish loads. Compared to a Skippy a trickle filter could be about one quarter the size and handle the same amount of ammonia.

If electric cost is important a very small pump can be used.

Imo the skimmer removal of leaves is small benefit. More importantly to me is removal of dust. Because of surface tension water can hold a layer of dust and it looks bad imo, especially when the sun is at certain angles. Skimmers remove that.

 

[Waterbug]

I also remove and throw out the foam in pumps. They do more harm than good. They're just a cheap marketing way to be able to say you're buying a "filter". Putting the pump after the skimmer basket allows the basket to act as a prefilter, keeping large stuff out of the pump.

 

[pondlover]

I really appreciate all the feed back and tips I am getting on this forum. :razz: We managed to get the remainder of the digging and get all the shelves shaped. We have a milk crate in the hole where the skimmer is going to be. Still haven't decided on a submersible or external pump. Hoping to be able to place liner in next weekend. Although we've had some very cold days, it's been much easier. Husband and I are both every sore from all the digging we've done. He says it looks like we are building a hot tub! He's been tamping soil most of the afternoon.

 

[taherrmann4]

Pondlover I use an External pump b/c I needed the volume it sucks for my waterfall and two creeks. You can't even hear my pump with the waterfall, and I built a house for it which is the size of an average dog house. I also can hardly tell the energy it uses on my electric bill. I have a skimmer and like it, I have lots and lots of leaves plus I sit on a hill by the ohio river so we get tons of wind and everything seems to find its way in it. I am going to add another inlet so I am only drawing half the water through the skimmer as I am currently drawing a ton of water through it and can clog in one day if I don't empty it. I really have my skimmer on the wrong side of the pond b/c the wind blows the debris the opposite side of where the skimmer is, but would not work the other way with the way the pond and all the streams are set up.

Good job on the dig so far.

 

[koiguy1969]

T-mann i can run all my pumps and 50 more with no effect on my water bill....now the electric bill may take a beating!.... what size pump do you run?

 

[taherrmann4]

T-mann i can run all my pumps and 50 more with no effect on my water bill....now the electric bill may take a beating!.... what size pump do you run?

It was supposed to say electric bill, i just edited it. Oops. I have a Sequence 7200.

 

[sissy]

I have one of those meters and it works great to let you know energy use .It was only 24 dollars and neat to check everything .Strange though I have 2 pumps same brand same model 1 year difference in purchase date and the older one uses less energy than the newer one .I guess could be a fluke but those meters do work and worth the little bit of money .Helps you keep from overloading your circuit breaker also .Which can be a safety concern .

 

[pondlover]

Has anyone used landscape fabric as their liner underlayment?

 

[addy1]

Has anyone used landscape fabric as their liner underlayment?

i have read that it works, I have used carpet pad, mainly. Anything to put a layer between a sharp rock and the liner

 

[j.w]

I used several old blankets/mattress covers in mine and we have real sandy soil and hardly any rocks so prolly did not even need the blankets but put them in just for precaution. You can use pretty much anything that's soft and protective.

 

[sissy]

I used landscaping underlayment and i just tripled it up .I had a lot left over when I did the rocks on my hillside and since I had to redo the pond this summer i used that when i noticed the other was not in the greatest shape and then decided to dig the pond a little deeper .It was all i had and sense I was on a time crunch to get the fish back in figured what the heck it is similar .I tripled it on the bottom of the pond