I need some help please!

While at Lowes on my lunch break the other day,saw a 18watt uv and 800gph biological filter on clearance.(The boxes had been in the sun and bleached.) My pond is about 500 gallons,and I've yet to buy a pump. The pond has a waterfall that equates to about 4 ft lift from the bottom of the pond. I need help to figure out what size pump and if the stuff I bought will work or be overkill.
Thanks
Lena

the measurements on the pond are 7'long x 5'wide and about 2' deep
Pardon my photos we're a work in progress and trying to figure out how to kill the daylilys(aka ditchlilys) behind the pond-any suggestions on that would be greatly appreciated as well!
And a link to my pond photo http://i34.photobucket.com/albums/d104/countrycatcandle/pond001.jpg

In don't think you can over kill on the filter the more filteration the better.

The pump should say on the package what it's GPH at 4' is, most pumps give all that info, if not on the package then on the company's website, it won't be 800 GPH with a 4' lift.

lenaky

You can never have too much filter or pump. You measure head (lift) from the top of the water not the bottom of the pond. You have to add 1' of head to every 10' of hose.

thanks I ended up buying a 2500 gph at lowes last weekend and love the results. Even my fiance who thought I needed a much smaller pump agrees. Now we're trying to put the bio/uv filter together(it came with a picture for instructions!) and I'll post photos once we get it going.
thanks!

The set up stuff is enough to make you pull your hair out. I just finished replumbing mine this winter and changed out all of the black hose and put everything in 1.5" pvc. DH hates my pond and cusses everytime he has to work on it so I put off changes as long as I can. I think we will be much happier with the pvc. What caused the whole mess was we had to dig up a water line and one of us poked a hole in the black pipe with a shovel so then we couldn't get it to not leak (that's where the cussing comes in) so had to replace the pipe so we just plumbed it in pvc. I put my discharge line from the filter in pvc and buried it so I don't have to mess with it anymore either.

Hey, dylancgc. When working on my little goldfish pond I somehow punctured, without knowing it, a black irrigation line for our underground sprinklers. Oh Boy! We went to dinner and came back to find the sidewalk and driveway about to wash out from the flood. I'm a little gal who can't get the lid off of a jar of pickles. How I managed to cut that stuff I'll never know. Talk about cussing! My DH is not in love with my ponds either. He is getting better though. Maybe yours will come around too. He will try to mechanically arrange things that make it easy for ME to operate alone and I must say he has been thoughtful in that respect. But, if I die befor him, he will have the bulldozer waiting and running in the yard to fill them in as soon as he comes home from my funeral.

Snapple 45
Mine may not wait for the funeral. I told him if he dies before me his cows will be in town before he is in the ground, I think he is the same way with my pond.

We have had several disagreements about my pond because he didn't have a clue and had to do it his way and I would let him because "you don't know what you are talking about" and then when his way didn't work for the 3-4th time we did it my way and, imagine that, it works. I heard him mutter under his breath, "I guess I'll shut up now". Now when I tell him how I want it done he says ok AFTER the first argument not the 4th. DH says if he argues he doesn't feel he has lost quite as bad. :o)

The first year I had just the upper pond working and I hated it because I let him have his way and he came home from work and passed me in the yard and he said where are you going, I told him I was going to drown myself in my pond. We tore it out and redid it my way the next weekend.

The only time he helps is if I need help with a big rock or something. The day we put the liner in the bottom pond I got my help lined up and I thought he had to work that day, Saturday, so I didn't tell him what I had lined up, anyway he didn't work and I had to tell him what was gonna happen. I told him he was not allowed to be there cause I didn't want to listen to him gripe so he went and brush hogged on the back part of our land until I got done. It went much smoother that way.

People compliment him on what a pretty pond and garden and I heard him say it wasn't his doing, "that's the wife's mess". He calls my flowers "glorified weeds". He does do some reading now on my pond,"to make sure I do it right", he is interested and even picked out some fish when I went to buy some more last summer but, "that's the wife's mess", men are so funny. :o) This spring when catalogs came he picked out a few flowers "glorified weeds" he liked also.

I guess I'll keep him around though, who else would help me hand dig a 9000 gallon koi pond, in full sun in the middle of the summer. He even bought me a new pick to dig it with. :o) One weekend when I was gone to KC to see my dad who had cancer, I got home and he had dug quite a bit while I was gone. He's a keeper, after 29 years I'd hate to break in another one.

They MUST be related, your DH and mine. How sweet! - A new pick axe? I was thrilled when my DH got me a set of rock chisels to use. I did all the rock work including over 125 feet of flagstone path and a 20 x 10 patio. On the last flagstone path he really got into it. I never saw him work so hard, nor did I ever appreciate him more. What's more he pitched in without my asking. First time ever! Mine's a keeper too. Married 35 yrs. They do improve with age. This is where he helped. He also hired a guy to dig it out for me. That was a huge treat.

Snapple45
I was sanding down some of those old metal chairs and a glider and using my DH body buffer, grinder, and it was so huge & heavy, about 20 mins and I was worn out and I jokingly told him I wanted "a baby body buffer" for Christmas, he bought me one and a sanding thing that worked great. We were joking about it at a Valentines Day Banquet and the pastors wife (25) looked at us and another couple like we were nuts. The other couple, he had bought his wife a cow trailer for Christmas. You have to have a HUGE sense of humor for your marriage to last. A friend told me power tools don't count as presents, the heck they don't, I wanted it. I have lots of times gotten stuff totally impractical and I won't ever use it. I will use power tools, especially if I ask for them.