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Journal New project for me week off

Tucker90

Member
Joined
28 Feb 2016
Messages
358
Location
Derby
So, I’ve wanted a pond for as long as I can remember.

The wife gave the go ahead so I’ve started looking into it! Got a bit excited and did a quick layout.

Looked into pumps/filters and liners so will list what I’ve seen below!

I want to keep koi in there as well as some others probably some golden orf and good fish.

Here’s the layout : 2600mm long and 1400mm at its widest. Plan to have a variety of shelves around 15cm to 30cm. With the deepest been around 90cm in the middle where the pump will go.

Rough volume will be 3500L

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I have priced up a pump and filter set up from all pond solutions, looking at 2.3 turn over an hour. Not ideal for koi I know but the price jumps considerably for the 12000lph pump. And I think it would be too powerful for the pond anyway! As I was a natural stone waterfall in the corner.

Here’s the filter:

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Any and all advice would be very much appreciated!! I have never had a pond before so I’m all ears! So before I buy anything or break ground I’d like some reassurance!

Thanks
Thom


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Hi Tucker, nice green garden you have!
I know you are excited and keen to find out all about ponds but dont rush into anything.
You will have to make some big decisions before you start digging but i will start the ball rolling and suggest you studdy koi carp requirements.
They grow big .. like three feet long and live a long time, they eat a lot and poo a lot.
There is another thread going on at the moment about building a pond......
 
Hi Tucker, nice green garden you have!
I know you are excited and keen to find out all about ponds but dont rush into anything.
You will have to make some big decisions before you start digging but i will start the ball rolling and suggest you studdy koi carp requirements.
They grow big .. like three feet long and live a long time, they eat a lot and poo a lot.
There is another thread going on at the moment about building a pond......

Thanks for the reply!

I’ve done a fair bit of reading already! Not only on pond building but koi as well.

I understand their requirements with regards size of pond and water needs.

I would be buying 3-4” koi, and moving them on when they got too big anyway. Nothing too big.


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Foxfish is not wrong.

How will you get to the back of your pond? From here it looks like the fence is too close.
Where will you "move them on" to? Koi really do grow fast and need a lot of looking after, I really would not recommend them for a beginners pond
Have you decided how to return the water?
It does look interesting.
 
Sorry but I agree with Foxfish and martin-green, koi deserve a bigger, deeper pond

And definitely work out the re-homing aspect before beginning with a fish that will outgrow your aquarium/pond (obviously if you have better quality fish, shops will be more interested in accepting fish)

Having got that out of the way, how many fish are you intending to add?

Obviously Green Aqua pond is similar to your own plans, so that’s a good example of what filtration to use for koi (note GA only have 3 koi in the pond, and 12000 l/h filter plus a lot of plant filtering)

Note Peter’s (Amateur Aquatics) comments re filters

btw Lovely Garden!
 
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Sorry but I agree with Foxfish and martin-green, koi deserve a bigger, deeper pond

And definitely work out the re-homing aspect before beginning with a fish that will outgrow your aquarium/pond (obviously if you have better quality fish, shops will be more interested in accepting fish)

Having got that out of the way, how many fish are you intending to add?

Obviously Green Aqua pond is similar to your own plans, so that’s a good example of what filtration to use for koi (note GA only have 3 koi in the pond, and 12000 l/h filter plus a lot of plant filtering)

Note Peter’s (Amateur Aquatics) comments re filters

btw Lovely Garden!

Thanks alto! It’s taken a lot of work but getting closer to the end result!

The re-homing aspect is easy, a work colleague, who I will be getting the fry/yearlings from has a 35000L koi pond with best part of £10k worth of filters.

But I understand where everyone is coming from. I will maybe consider alternatives, golden orf, Rudd and maybe fancy gold fish.

Thanks for the advice!


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Foxfish is not wrong.

How will you get to the back of your pond? From here it looks like the fence is too close.
Where will you "move them on" to? Koi really do grow fast and need a lot of looking after, I really would not recommend them for a beginners pond
Have you decided how to return the water?
It does look interesting.

Not sure what you mean return the water, I will be putting a return pump leading back to the filter. If that’s what you mean?!

As for the back of a pond, there will be 30cm of stone before the pond starts, access will be tricky but nothing a scaffolding board won’t cover. Either that or I’ll don my fishing waders!

As for re-homing see my reply to alto! I will get a picture of his pond and post here in the coming days! It’s very impressive!

After considering everyone’s comments I might leave the koi for this one!

Thank you for the advice though!


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Hi mate. It's all about funds. What your willing to spend on the pond and filters.
Here is my pond build thread on here mate
I keep koi. Tench orfs grass carp. Rudd.
Mostly koi carp.
https://r.tapatalk.com/shareLink/to...&share_fid=58521&share_type=t&link_source=app

First advice I would give lf koi keeping is you need a bottom drain in the pond. And gravity feed
To a decent filter. Something like an ea easy pod. Or even better a ea nexus 220.
Pressure filters are not for koi. Ok at the start. Pond depth
4 feet deep. They grow fast. I have a chagoi that grew from 4 inch to 2 feet in 18 months. She is 28 years old now.
If your pump feeding the pump will mash up the crap. But it will still work. You would need a machanical filter placed before your bio filter. To catch the crap. Something like a sieve. Then say a nexus after it for bio.
Couple of photos of my pond. You need any help just ask away mate.
Fred
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Ok that’s great then!
Although personally I think the beauty of koi is not only how they look but watching them grow and getting attracted to the individual fish.
Obviously a purpose koi pond is considerably different in design and function that the one you have planed.

After seeing your garden pictures on the gardens thread, it is obvious you have some skills so I would like to propose an alternative method of construction for your pond!

Firstly... I am not a fan of liner ponds, trying to fit a flat sheet in an irregular shaped hole will always end up with unsightly and dirt trapping folds .... and in my mind a liner is always prone to damage and punctures and can only ever be a considered temporary construction!
Many years ago I developed a way to build small ponds that is not that difficult to build but is far superior to any liner pond.
Although more expensive to build the method will last a life time and you won’t have to worry about getting in there with tools or walking in it and it will look like gold in comparison to a wrinkled rubber liner!
(HaHa forever the salesman)
Anyway here is the method for building a small garden pond.... dig the hole to any shape , plaster the sides with 4-1 sand and cement, this may require severe coats to get a nice shape and finish but is very easy to do. Then coat with fibreglass!
Really simple, I don’t know the cost of fibreglass but where I live it works out around £25 per meter squared for materials only and around £40 pms to have it professionally applied .
I realise you probably just want to get on with it a stick a rubber liner in but I thought I would offer you an option.
 
Seeing as it looks like this pond is for decorative purposes :headphone: why not build a water feature instead? Easier to build, less maintenance and will sound nice from your "sun deck"
 
Right, it’s dug, 3,8” deep, I hit clay so though since I’m not gonna keep koi I can leave it there.

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My question is, how would you lot go about edging it? I have these stones and a lot more if needed, to use but unsure on how to go about it!

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My idea was to dig round a 2” shelf, place stones around the pond and fill with gravel to make cutting the grass easier?!

Thoughts?


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To make it look as natural as possible the stones should be partially in the water which means the liner should go under the stones and lip up behind them.
So you could cut another 50-75mm shallow shelf and save the turf, place in your liner an fill the pond near to the top, place the stones , lift the liner up behind the stones and tightly refit the turf, finally cut of the liner flush with the grass.
 
To make it look as natural as possible the stones should be partially in the water which means the liner should go under the stones and lip up behind them.
So you could cut another 50-75mm shallow shelf and save the turf, place in your liner an fill the pond near to the top, place the stones , lift the liner up behind the stones and tightly refit the turf, finally cut of the liner flush with the grass.

Thanks fox!

I completely understand what you mean!

I was going to do similar to that but have a gravel border around the stones to make cutting the grass easier, similar to this :

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Think I might cement the stones down in order to prevent the gravel doing in the pond!


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Ok, depending on the quality of the liner and it flexibility, you might have to back up the liner with cement as the gravel may not hold it neatly in place .
Personally I am not a fan of gravel as it never stays put and will migrate over the grass.
It might be easier to strim around the stones or just mow close to the stones and let the grass grow longer around the stones.
 
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