Gill Passman Wrote:
Hi All,

After lurking on this group for a few months and a lot of research
elsewhere
I am almost ready to finalize the plans for our pond.

We will most likely be using pond liner due to the area to be covered
and
the fact that it won't be completely square or rectangular. The
structure
will be decking panels. I will probably need to put a grid in
short-term
because of my 4 year old daughter. We are planning to keep fish in here
-
hubbie wants Koi but this is still up for debate.

The pond is going to be raised around 2-3 foot above ground level. I
was
wondering if we need to dig below the surface at all as well? The
problem is
that our soakaway runs around six inches below where the end of the
pond is
going to be. Of course there is the possibility to dig deeper at the
other
end of where the pond is planned for.

Any thoughts on this would be helpful - especially on the need to dig
and if
yes how deep?

Thanks
Gill


To determine if you should have an above ground, below ground or a
below ground pond with raised ledges depends on your climate and your
preferences. A below ground pond is well insulated by the soil, versus
an above ground which is not. Are you going to keep fish? If so and
you will have freezing weather then you will have to take them inside
to overwinter them.

A raised pond is easier to build and not all that dirt to move. But a
below ground pond that is at least 3 feet will tolerate freezing
weather, and will be cooler in hot weaher. You can easily overwinter
fish and many plants in a dug pond that is 3 feet.

Digging a pond is hard work and very dirty. But the results are worth
it. I would not like to take my fish inside for the winter- I have a
Koi who is 30 inches and a couple others over 24". They overwinter in
zone 6a with only a small pump going.

Good luck and happy ponding. I suggest you go above ground and shallow
and build deeper an bigger when your child is older. Also situate your
pond in an area with good drainage. Water under the liner, under the
ledges will undermine your pond walls.


--
Koitoy

On Mon, 16 May 2005 "Gill Passman" wrote:

I'm looking into filtration systems.... snip
Gill

Hi Gill,

Do take a look at mine. :-) Click on *My Filter*. ~ jan

See my ponds and filter design:
www.jjspond.us

~Keep 'em Wet!~
Tri-Cities WA Zone 7a
To e-mail see website

I'm not an expert at this, but in my case building my pond took three
years. Year one after moving into the "New House" my wife and I built a
retaining wall out of limestone rock and concrete and let that sit a year.
Year two saw us backfilling the wall, along with trying to compact the
soil. After which we let it sit for a winter before we dug the pond out
in year three.

The whole project is still in the works (you can view it at
wwww.shadowsfall.org )but has been going for a couple of years now. We
live in the Sierra Foothills at 2100' about 60 miles north of Yosemite and
the Koi over winter very well. Someday when I don't have to build a pond
on a budget I'll rip it out and do it over but as it is, it provides water
for the dog, cats, birds, frogs (I hear them right now) and dragonflys, a
place for the kids (4, 7 and 9) to catch polywogs (I make them practace
"Catch and Release with them), and the sound of falling water.

Ted

Molon Labe


On Sun, 15 May 2005 19:26:28 +0100, Gill Passman wrote:

Hi All,

After lurking on this group for a few months and a lot of research elsewhere
I am almost ready to finalize the plans for our pond.

We will most likely be using pond liner due to the area to be covered and
the fact that it won't be completely square or rectangular. The structure
will be decking panels. I will probably need to put a grid in short-term
because of my 4 year old daughter. We are planning to keep fish in here -
hubbie wants Koi but this is still up for debate.

The pond is going to be raised around 2-3 foot above ground level. I was
wondering if we need to dig below the surface at all as well? The problem is
that our soakaway runs around six inches below where the end of the pond is
going to be. Of course there is the possibility to dig deeper at the other
end of where the pond is planned for.

Any thoughts on this would be helpful - especially on the need to dig and if
yes how deep?

Thanks
Gill

Gill Passman wrote:
Hi All,

After lurking on this group for a few months and a lot of research elsewhere
I am almost ready to finalize the plans for our pond.

Not exactly sure from you description what you have in mind.
Be careful if you are putting treated decking close to your pond. The
runoff from the decking can be very poisonous to fish.

George wrote:


Another alternative would be to create a veggie pond above your main pond and
let the water from that cascade down in a waterfall to the main pond. Veggies
seem to have less problems with clogging, but I really don't have a lot of
experience with them. My plants are in the pond itself. Others here in this
forum are more experienced with veggie filters, so if you are interested, you
could ask about them, and someone will likely tell you more about them than I
can. I understand that they work very well, and are quite attractive.


On the subject of veggie filter plants I am really happy with using
WaterCest (I expect it would do well in an english climate). It grows
well in the top of my filter growing roots down around the river stones
as the water wells up then spills off to the side to form the water
fall. I originally used water hyacines but the Crest tolerates the
shade conditions of my pond much better (added bonus you can eat it!).
My "starter plants" was simply a small bunch of WaterCrest from the
local grocer. It is happy to root in flowing water and comes back year
after year tolerating the mild freezing we get in our winters in BC.

"Greg Cooper" wrote in message
news:DrZhe.118882$3V3.9528@edtnps89...
George wrote:


Another alternative would be to create a veggie pond above your main
pond and
let the water from that cascade down in a waterfall to the main pond.
Veggies
seem to have less problems with clogging, but I really don't have a lot
of
experience with them. My plants are in the pond itself. Others here in
this
forum are more experienced with veggie filters, so if you are
interested, you
could ask about them, and someone will likely tell you more about them
than I
can. I understand that they work very well, and are quite attractive.


On the subject of veggie filter plants I am really happy with using
WaterCest (I expect it would do well in an english climate). It grows
well in the top of my filter growing roots down around the river stones
as the water wells up then spills off to the side to form the water
fall. I originally used water hyacines but the Crest tolerates the
shade conditions of my pond much better (added bonus you can eat it!).
My "starter plants" was simply a small bunch of WaterCrest from the
local grocer. It is happy to root in flowing water and comes back year
after year tolerating the mild freezing we get in our winters in BC.

Like the sound of the Watercress....I'll be doing some research on Veggie
filters I think.

Thanks

"Greg Cooper" wrote in message
news:78Zhe.64445$HR1.17483@clgrps12...
Gill Passman wrote:
Hi All,

After lurking on this group for a few months and a lot of research
elsewhere
I am almost ready to finalize the plans for our pond.

Not exactly sure from you description what you have in mind.
Be careful if you are putting treated decking close to your pond. The
runoff from the decking can be very poisonous to fish.

It was more the outer cladding that was going to be decking material so that
it fits in with the character of that part of the garden - another option
would be railway sleepers but these seep resin as well. The pond itself
would be raised above the level of the decking so there would be no run off
from the deck itself.

Not quite sure what to "top it off" with as most timber would be treated in
some way or another.....having a think on that one.

"George" wrote in message
news:QBRhe.81541$NU4.58521@attbi_s22...

"Gill Passman" gillspamattaylorpassmanspam.co.uk wrote in message
.. .

"George" wrote in message
news:MmQhe.80298$r53.16454@attbi_s21...

"Gill Passman" gillspamattaylorpassmanspam.co.uk wrote in message
.. .

"~Roy~" wrote in message
...


DUH!


On Sun, 15 May 2005 15:34:51 -0500, "Reel McKoi" of
mumbled something to the effect of:


===If it deep freezes where you live you would need some kind of
heater
to keep
===an area unfrozen - or dig below the frost line. As you know
the
fish will
===not survive being frozen solid.

Give the folks a break. I am sure they are well aware most fish
would
not take kindly to being encased in a block of ice...........And you
did not answer the question either.

YOu can get my with most any depth, but deeper is better in the
colder
climes, as you can take advantage of warmer ground temps and if you
install a stock tank heater you can get my with even shallower
depths.
Don't take it for granted if the frost level is only 2 feet your
safe
at 3 feet......odds are it will bite you one day. A lot of folks
have
kept fish in the cold climes at depths of 3 feet or less with the
use
of a heater in the pond, or with a shelter over the pond with a bit
of
heat inside.......Personally I would make it as deep as I could,
and
if it turns out its not quite deep enough add a heat source, or move
fish indoors during winter season as a lot also do.




==============================================
Put some color in your cheeks...garden naked!

~~~~ }((((o ~~~~~~ }{{{{o ~~~~~~~ }(((((o

Moving the fish indoors is not an option - we are already over-run
with
tropical tanks - 6 at the last count and more planned he, he....a
heater
is
a good option and one I have already thought of....

Our winters vary....this year was very mild down here but not in the
rest of
the UK where there was a big freeze. When I had a pond before I saw a
good
2-3 inches of ice - used a football to provide air.

Maybe if I dig down an extra couple of feet where I can without going
into
the soakaway this might provide additional sanctuary for the fish -
and
have
the bulk of it 2-3 feet with a heater - what do you think?

Thanks
Gill


You can contact your local university (a geology department) and find
out
how
deep the frostline is (the depth at which the soil will freeze over the
winter)
in your area, then you should dig at least 5-6 inches to a foot below
(deeper is
even better) to make sure that your pond will not freeze solid during a
hard
winter. The frostline here is at 22 inches, so the deepest part of my
pond
27"deep (but it is also 18 inches aboveground - surrounded and
structural
held
by 6 inch x 6 inch timbers, so the total depth is 45 inches). I also
use
an
aerator in the winter and keep my waterfall going as long as possible.
When the
water gets around 40 F, I keep the aewrator going, turn off the
waterfall,
and I
use start to use a pond deicer, which works very well in keeping the
worst
of
the ice off the surface of the pond. If you decide on raising Koi
(they
get
large, but are a joy to raise), the aerator will be very important in
the
winter, especially if you turn off any circulation you may have. Koi
get
much
larger than goldfish, and have a higher oxygen demand. Also, if you
raise
Koi,
you really should have a filtration system. It doesn't have to be
expensive, it
just has to work, and preferably be easy to maintain. I hope this
helps,
and
feel free to come back and ask more questions (and do ignore the
trolls).
Good
luck.



Thanks George,
I will speak to the local Uni - my Mother works there...and btw it was
this
ng that taught me about killfiles - lol - have been monitoring for 3
months
plus - learnt more than I ever wanted to about things I never wanted to
think about....IMO the more "pond related" questions we all ask the
better
even if from beginners....lets flood it with fish questions.....but that
is
another topic....

I'm looking into filtration systems....at the moment I quite fancy the
idea
of including the filtration in an upper level which will eventually
become a
waterfall type of thing into the main pond....this will almost certainly
need to be custom I think....on the majority of my large tropical tanks
I
have external filters with a variety of media which work very well and
certainly external filtration is an option...but my thought is maybe I
feed
through this on the upper level, filter it there and then cascade the
water
down is an alternative.....now obviously the cascade will be central so
on
the other side I'm looking at heavily planting

Gill


If your filter is above the main pond, and you are pumping water from the
main
pond to the filter (positive pressure) and letting it cascade back into
the main
pond, please remember to build some kind of spillway to prevent overflow
in case
the filter gets clogged. I can't stress this enough. And then there is
the
problem of preventing the pump from getting glogged. I worked around this
problem (and since I had a limited area to begin with, I really didn't
have a
choice). What I did was to build the filter into the main pond at one end
(below
water level). Then I surrounded it with rocks, and built them up to a
level
above the filter (in fact, out of the water altogether) to create a
waterfall.
In other words, my waterfall comes out of the pond at one end. The filter
is
submerged beneath it. Oh, but how do you clean it, you may ask? The
answer is
that I don't. At least, only rarely, and then, only by backflushing with
a
garden hose, which takes about 2 minutes. The filter is a biological
filter,
and it has a pre-filter which sits at the bottom of the pond. The
pre-filter
catches most of the suspended solids in the water, so it is mostly a
mechanical
filter, although it does do some biological filtration as well. I clean
it out
about every 2-4 weeks. It takes about five minutes to clean. I have a
marine
aquarium, and frankly I'd rather clean the pond than clean it. That
leaves
primarily cleaned water (but still disolved nutrient-laden) that goes into
the
main filter, which is an old jacuzzi filter that I converted for this
purpose.
It is half full of coarse gravel (about 50 lbs). The water enters from a
hose
connected from the pre-filter to the main filter at the bottom. Then the
water
flows through a basket strainer, and then the gravel (which is where the
beneficial microbes live) and up to the pump above the gravel. The water
then
exits the filter at the top and flows into a three gallon decorative clay
pot
full of porous lava rock, which has holes about halfway up. The water
flows
through the lava rock and over it, and out of the holes, then over the
waterfall
and back into the pond (this is a new addition that isn't shown on the web
link,
below).

You can adapt this method (called the suction method, as opposed to
postive
pressure, which you would have if you simply place the pump in the bottom
of the
pond and pumped the water into a filter above the level of the pond) by
simply
using a different container. I've used a 20-gallon plastic sealable new
(never
used) chemical drum on my sister's pond with great results. In her case,
the
pond was concrete and was already built, so I dug a hole next to the pond,
behind the waterfall, and placed the filter below ground there, with only
the
cover showing (which was hidden with potted plants). The top of the lid
had a
valve that could be used to backflush the filter by connecting a water
hose to
it. I then dug a trench from the pond to the filter. I drilled a hole
into the
concrete about a 15 inches below the water line (after lowering the water
level,
of course), and installed a sealable bulkhead fitting through the hole. I
sealed the hole with hydraulic cement, and placed bentonite around the
outside
of the hole to prevent leaks. Then I ran piping from the bulkhead to the
filter, and connected a flexible hose to the bulkhead on the inside (the
hose
had a basket strainer on its other end), and ran it to a milkcrate which
sat on
the bottom, on which the strainer sat. This way, the water in the
piping/hose
always stays below the surface water level and the system never loses its
prime.
It only cost about $30 to make (not including the pump). This setup
didn't have
a pre-filter, and my sister ended up backflushing a lot more often than I
ever
do, which is rarely.

Another alternative would be to create a veggie pond above your main pond
and
let the water from that cascade down in a waterfall to the main pond.
Veggies
seem to have less problems with clogging, but I really don't have a lot of
experience with them. My plants are in the pond itself. Others here in
this
forum are more experienced with veggie filters, so if you are interested,
you
could ask about them, and someone will likely tell you more about them
than I
can. I understand that they work very well, and are quite attractive.

There are lots of possibilities. My experience is that if you pre-filter
the
water before you send it to your main filter (whatever that may be), you
will
have better results, and make cleaning a lot easier, since all you have to
do is
fish the pre-filter out of the bottom with a coathanger and rinse it out,
using
the sludge for fertilizer for your lawn plants. They will thank you for
the
effort. Oh, and whatever you do, it is always best not to set the
pre-filter
inlet right on the bottom. You don't want it getting clogged with leaves
or
sludge from the bottom. Always place the inlet a few inches off the
bottom. My
pre-filter has the inlet on its top (about a foot off the bottom).

Here are some details on the filtration system I use:

http://home.insightbb.com/~jryates/filter.htm

Good luck.


Thanks for that posting ;-)

A lot of stuff in there for me to consider. Actually I hadn't thought about
the feed to the upper level getting blocked.....Maybe I should just plant it
out to give a little extra filtration prior to the water going down to the
lower level.

Been out with a tape measure today and we certainly have space for hiding
some external canisters.

Had a look at your filter system and Jan's. More info to digest....

BTW I like the pond - very similar in style to the sort of thing we are
thinking about.....

Thanks again
Gill

"Gill Passman" gillspamattaylorpassmanspam.co.uk wrote in message
.. .

"Greg Cooper" wrote in message
news:DrZhe.118882$3V3.9528@edtnps89...
George wrote:


Another alternative would be to create a veggie pond above your main
pond and
let the water from that cascade down in a waterfall to the main pond.
Veggies
seem to have less problems with clogging, but I really don't have a
lot
of
experience with them. My plants are in the pond itself. Others here
in
this
forum are more experienced with veggie filters, so if you are
interested, you
could ask about them, and someone will likely tell you more about them
than I
can. I understand that they work very well, and are quite attractive.


On the subject of veggie filter plants I am really happy with using
WaterCest (I expect it would do well in an english climate). It grows
well in the top of my filter growing roots down around the river stones
as the water wells up then spills off to the side to form the water
fall. I originally used water hyacines but the Crest tolerates the
shade conditions of my pond much better (added bonus you can eat it!).
My "starter plants" was simply a small bunch of WaterCrest from the
local grocer. It is happy to root in flowing water and comes back year
after year tolerating the mild freezing we get in our winters in BC.

Like the sound of the Watercress....I'll be doing some research on Veggie
filters I think.

Thanks

The whole project is still in the works (you can view it at
www.shadowsfall.org )but has been going for a couple of years now.

Really nice Ted. ~ jan :-)

~Power to the Porg, Flow On!~