Pumps always clog up! Solutions...

[juanprieto]

I have a very good filtration system but it seems that the bottleneck is the submersible pumps. They are solids handling so small items are not a problem for them. But junk in the water mostly never makes it to my filtration system. The thing is that the protective screen around the pump gets full of algae and floating sediment. In a day or two it collects so much stuff that water flow is very compromised. This not only is bad for the pump but if I can't get gunk through the plumbing to the filters then they are not doing their job. The filters in my two bio falls are always clean which tells me nothing is getting to them. So the beneficial bacteria doesn't have much to chomp up.

I tried a screen mesh around the pump enclosure but now instead of the pump cover getting clogged the mesh does. Which means I have to get in the water, remove the mesh, hose it down and put it back over the pump. I have to do this every 2-3 days! My water is clear and there is not much that should get stuck in there but somehow stuff does. Does anyone have a suggestion for how to deal with this so that I don't have to constantly be cleaning the housing cover out? I thought about removing the housing and just putting the naked pump in the pond by itself so that junk can circulate to the bio falls. I know I run the risk of a stick or something hard messing up the impellers but honestly I rarely get anything more then algae or a few plant leaves.

Attached is a photo of one of my pumps and one of how it gets in 2 days.

 

[mrsclem]

You don't want a lot of solid debris going into your filter. The best solution is to raise your pump up off the bottom.

 

[juanprieto]

You don't want a lot of solid debris going into your filter. The best solution is to raise your pump up off the bottom.

It’s not coming in from the bottom. It’s floating gunk the flows into the pump housing from the top. The pump housing has no openings on the bottom or sides. Only on the top which sits off the pond bottom.

 

[Jhn]

Couple things if the pump is sucking floating crap into it from the surface, try putting down a little deeper but still off the bottom. In the pic it looks like it is inches under the water surface.

I see a skimmer, is there a pump in there? If so, Why is this pump then being used?

Lastly your beneficial bacteria doesn’t need crap getting to it, to do their job. Breaking down crud isn’t the job they do. What beneficial bacteria does be it in a filter or any wet surface in our ponds is keeps our pond from building up toxic amounts of ammonia and nitrite, this is found in the water not the mulm/debris in the water.

 

[juanprieto]

Couple things if the pump is sucking floating crap into it from the surface, try putting down a little deeper but still off the bottom. In the pic it looks like it is inches under the water surface.

I see a skimmer, is there a pump in there? If so, Why is this pump then being used?

Lastly your beneficial bacteria doesn’t need crap getting to it, to do their job. Breaking down crud isn’t the job they do. What beneficial bacteria does be it in a filter or any wet surface in our ponds is keeps our pond from building up toxic amounts of ammonia and nitrite, this is found in the water not the mulm/debris in the water.

I originally built a small 9 foot oval pond. It had a biofalls and a skimmer opposite it. It is shallow at 16 inches in the perimeter and about 20 in the middle. We have coral rock here so there's that. The skimmer has a pump that feeds the waterfall. This is the skimmer you see. I then built a larger 16 foot oval pond and and joined it to the other one via a shallow channel. It is deeper at 24-38 inches. This larger pond also has a biofalls opposite that flows into the mentioned skimmer via the channel. I put the pump( the one in the picture) right in front of the skimmer so that water flow circulates the entire pond and there is no current crossing each other. I have a third small pump next to that one that feeds an Oase filtration system. It is also on the bottom next to the one in the picture. See diagram I am including.

 

[GBBUDD]

i'm assuming the new bigger pond has a newer bigger pump as well i would place the strongest pump into the skimmer one that has pre filters and then it runs up to the bio falls to the big pond. This will also help with ease of cleaning . as tye filters are now at ground level or close to , being in the bio falls and skimmer,

 

[Lisak1]

Never been a fan of in-pond pumps for this very reason.

And ditto for the explanation about your filter. Remember - ponds need two types of filtration: mechanical (for the solid debris) and biological (for the water quality). You should never be feeding organic solids to your bio filter.