Water Gardening: unsuccessful pond clean-out :(, 1 by TXMel

TXMel wrote:
So as to not scare off other potential pond people I must state that:

Our pond is 4 years old. We did go thru the pea soup stage. We do use clay in our pots with stones on top, and have no problems. With PROPER biological systems in place, you do not have to shock the system with UV lights, chemicals, or draining. When you drain the water, you are introducing chlorine and all of the other chemically treated water back into your pond, fish and plants. You must start over to obtain a balance in that biology. After our second year, things started to get better, and now we merely have to keep the waterflow cleared so that the flow can reach the filter station so that it naturally cleans the water returning back into the pond.

The quilt batting sounds like a similar system to what we have in place in our skimmer box. There is a net to catch larger debris, which we clean weekly, sometimes more often depending on how much stirring activity is going on. After the net is a thick (1 1/2") mesh, like a plastic batting that lays on top of the pump, filtering the water before it is pumped 40' away to a bag of lava rocks that filter water coming in to the top waterfall system. This is enough to keep the water filtered easily.

The ONE thing that we have found keeps our water clear, with very little effort, is adding 1/4 cup of a liquid organic product called AquaClearer by Aquascape Designs. It is a liquid bacteria & Enzymes. A mixture of beneficial bacteria. We buy one gallon of AquaClearer for $45. This lasts for a full year. We try to add this to the skimmer box every Sunday evening.

I would suspect that Earthworm is deeply lacking beneficial bacteria at this point, and should see pea soup very shortly!

I hope that this helps to comfort those that are considering a pond and are afraid of the maintenance.We are TOTALLY enjoying ours!

melanie