please help me understand intake bays

[allif]

I'm curious about intake bays and wondering whether I should add one to my project (expanded small pond with bog filter). But I only have a single pump which
I planned to suspend near the bottom of the pond, to pump water to the bog). Every intake bay I've looked at has a pump (or is it a skimmer?) in it. Is there such a thing as a pumpless intake bay? Or a way to design one using my planned setup?
Sorry if I'm missing something obvious here....
Thanks in advance!

 

[combatwombat]

An intake bay is just a large skimmer that allows more collection of debris so you can go longer between cleanings. And they look more natural than a big plastic skimmer.

The pump doesn't have to live inside your intake bay, but it has to draw it's water from inside the bay, as that is how it creates a draw across the surface of the water, which creates the skimming action.

Unless you wanted to use an external pump, there would be no point building an intake bay and then placing your pump somewhere else in the pond because part of the value of the intake bay is giving your pump a place to live that is easy to access and service.

Why you're planning to suspend the pump near the bottom of the pond? What are you hoping to accomplish with that?

 

[allif]

This is first and foremost a duck pond. So the bog is to filter all their waste.
And I've read that it's best to raise the pump off the pond floor so as not to suck up the big gunk.

I had thought maybe adding an intake bay could help solve the feathers and leaves problem by skimming those off to the side
before they settle. I had also kind of hoped I could add that just outside the duck's yard so frogs and insects
would have a safe place to enjoy the water as well. But...I don't want to prefilter the water before it gets to the bog so I guess I'll skip that.

 

[GBBUDD]

dont know why its starting at the end of the intake bay but just drag the red line to the left and stat it from the beginning

 

[allif]

dont know why its starting at the end of the intake bay but just drag the red line to the left and stat it from the beginning

great video, thank you! sounds like i'd do better with a negative edge. so now i'm wondering....do i redesign to have a negative edge
with largish rocks (so as not to filter water itself) that feeds back to the pond? it would be like a giant, large pore pre-filter (in my mind, anyway). it seems like i could then keep the pump in the pond itself, or no? would that even work? i'm starting to get myself a little confused now.

 

[Rashad]

I think the main advantage of an intake bay over a skimmer is that wildlife can't get trapped in an intake bay, they can easily swim in and out of the intake area. Also you can see when there is debris that needs getting picked up. An intake bay also spreads out the suction down through gravel so there isn't a strong pull in any one place.

 

[Rashad]

great video, thank you! sounds like i'd do better with a negative edge. so now i'm wondering....do i redesign to have a negative edge
with largish rocks (so as not to filter water itself) that feeds back to the pond? it would be like a giant, large pore pre-filter (in my mind, anyway). it seems like i could then keep the pump in the pond itself, or no? would that even work? i'm starting to get myself a little confused now.

The pump needs to be in the intake bay, in the zero edge water storage area, or an external pump that pulls water from those sources. Basically you need to be pulling water into those areas somehow, several options how to do it.

Edit: I'm lame and forgot that gravity pulls the water into the zero edge, but you need to pump water out of it somehow.

 

[allif]

The pump needs to be in the intake bay, in the zero edge water storage area, or an external pump that pulls water from those sources. Basically you need to be pulling water into those areas somehow, several options how to do it.

so the negative edge isn't simply gravity fed?
here's a truly awful sketch of what i was thinking:

where the arrows show the direction of water flow
(basically water is pumped from pond to bog, then back to pond via spillway from bog, with surface water getting sort of siphoned off the top over the negative edge, which drops into a larger pore gravel bed that connects to the pond under water - with the hope that there's enough pressure to minimze back flow but if not who care since the goal is to skim the surface). nuts? stupid? worthless?

 

[combatwombat]

@allif: A few notes:

1. There's no issue pre-filtering the large solids that an intake bay would filter before going to the bog. In fact, that would be primarily beneficial so as not to send a bunch of solids like feathers and leaves into the bog. There will be plenty of nutrients in the water for the bacteria to feast on. Especially in a duck pond.

2. A negative edge must live outside the pond and requires its own cistern. It cannot be connected to the pond. If the water in the pond is connected to the cistern, water level will simply level itself between the two vessels and no waterfall/drop will be possible. With a negative edge, water must be drawn from the cistern in order for the design to work. Same with intake bay. Water must be pumped from the bay for the design to work.

 

[allif]

@allif: A few notes:

1. There's no issue pre-filtering the large solids that an intake bay would filter before going to the bog. In fact, that would be primarily beneficial so as not to send a bunch of solids like feathers and leaves into the bog. There will be plenty of nutrients in the water for the bacteria to feast on. Especially in a duck pond.

2. A negative edge must live outside the pond and requires its own cistern. It cannot be connected to the pond. If the water in the pond is connected to the cistern, water level will simply level itself between the two vessels and no waterfall/drop will be possible. With a negative edge, water must be drawn from the cistern in order for the design to work. Same with intake bay. Water must be pumped from the bay for the design to work.

Thank you for explaining that. I knew there was something wrong with my logic
Back to the drawing board....

 

[GBBUDD]

A negative edge must live outside the pond and requires its own cistern. It cannot be connected to the pond.

That's not nessarily true. You can use the liner to come up to where it is just below the height of the sides of the pond so that like a bog the water runs out tge lowest point. The biggest trick to a negative edge imo is for it to be as wide as possible as well as being thick and shallow. You want to have a waterproof wall between the negative edge and the drop for the negative edge it does not need to be super deep but it doeshave to be wide/large enough so if the power goes out the water has somewhere to go. An area that can hold that much water and not fail.

 

[combatwombat]

That's not nessarily true. You can use the liner to come up to where it is just below the height of the sides of the pond so that like a bog the water runs out tge lowest point. The biggest trick to a negative edge imo is for it to be as wide as possible as well as being thick and shallow. You want to have a waterproof wall between the negative edge and the drop for the negative edge it does not need to be super deep but it doeshave to be wide/large enough so if the power goes out the water has somewhere to go. An area that can hold that much water and not fail.

That’s what I meant. Even if it’s the same liner, there has to be a waterproof separation between the pond and the cistern.

 

[GBBUDD]

But to me the negative edge has it all over the intake bay. There's no way to make any kind of a catch a mechanical filter other then everything getting sucked down through the rock. Where it will sit. The negative you can make several designs where you can make a basket or a slide to catch sediment to be manually removed.

 

[GBBUDD]

great video, thank you! sounds like i'd do better with a negative edge. so now i'm wondering....do i redesign to have a negative edge
with largish rocks (so as not to filter water itself) that feeds back to the pond? it would be like a giant, large pore pre-filter (in my mind, anyway). it seems like i could then keep the pump in the pond itself, or no? would that even work? i'm starting to get myself a little confused now.

Pump is pulling from or from within the negative edge. And in my case pumps to the bog where it has a waterfall drop to a stream that makes its way back to the pond where it then makes its way to the cistern

 

[allif]

Pump is pulling from or from within the negative edge. And in my case pumps to the bog where it has a waterfall drop to a stream that makes its way back to the pond where it then makes its way to the cistern

Ok i think i'm getting this. i don't know that i can work this out though so the pump pumps from the negative edge yet still
cycles through the full water column. my instinct tells me it would just circulate surface water.