Dirt in pond

In our part of Scotland we had four days of constant rain.
This made our raised pond quite dirty and murky.

It was just settling down again when I foolishly removed a Pepper grass
plant (by the grass, instead of grabbing the container) and silted it up
again !

Once again the pond starts to clear just fine.
However, this morning it's worse.

I've cleaned out the pump (Hozelock Titan 2000), the filter (Hozelock
EcoClear 2200UVC) is running OK and shows not enough "red" to need
cleaned.

The pond is 4'x3', 24'' deep,162 gallons, and is usually very clear (even
though there are two Shubunkins, two small Comets, two Golden Orfe fry, and
a very small Tench in residence...fear not the pond will be enlarged to cope
presently)

Unless my evil nephew has carried out his threat and dumped his two pond
loaches in without my knowledge ('cos I can't afford to buy his Ubertank...I
ask you, 400 gallons in a upstairs room ?? ), I don't know what's silting it
up ?

Peter

By silting up do you mean that there is suspended dirt in the water?
The fish might be stirring up the dirt that has settled to the bottom. Bottom
feeders are good at hovering up stuff and spitting it out again.
Not sure about your filters but sometimes you can add a layer of cotton or poly
batting and it will catch a lot of dirt. Do watch it closely to make sure it
doesn't clog up and send water over the side or out another way.


kathy :-)
algae primer
http://hometown.aol.com/ka30p/myhomepage/garden.html

"Ka30P" wrote in message
...

By silting up do you mean that there is suspended dirt in the water?
The fish might be stirring up the dirt that has settled to the bottom.
Bottom
feeders are good at hovering up stuff and spitting it out again.
Not sure about your filters but sometimes you can add a layer of cotton or
poly
batting and it will catch a lot of dirt. Do watch it closely to make sure
it
doesn't clog up and send water over the side or out another way.


kathy :-)

Yes, it is suspended dirt.
The filter returns via a waterfall (well, really a built in return hose
;-) ) so I think it's OK.

I don't have any pics of it at the moment, but if you have a look at
www.katzsisters.com it'll give you an idea of how clear it usually is.

Peter

"Ka30P" wrote in message
...

By silting up do you mean that there is suspended dirt in the water?
The fish might be stirring up the dirt that has settled to the bottom.
Bottom
feeders are good at hovering up stuff and spitting it out again.
Not sure about your filters but sometimes you can add a layer of cotton or
poly
batting and it will catch a lot of dirt. Do watch it closely to make sure
it
doesn't clog up and send water over the side or out another way.

Having owned an orange pond of an entire season, I can tell you...

1. Patience is key
2. It doesn't hurt to get in, stir it all up and then do a partial drain and
refill. Several of these will help.
3. If you let it all settle out, getting in and scooping out by hand, is a
big help, but that will certainly lead to stirring up the silt. See #2.
4. Water Hyacinth do a very nice job of collecting fine silt. And you can
wring the roots out too.
5. Solve the source. If you are still dumping silt in when it rains, no
amount of filtering will help.
6. Cotton batting works to a point, but is not an end solution.
7. Did I mention patience?

BV.