Tropical refit

Let me tell you a tale...

In the 1990s, a rental villa put in a koi-pond in the outdoor foyer area. They had an engineer design it who'd only ever done swimming pools (usual). It's in the sun a good portion of the day and 18" deep, so it turned green. So they put in a bigger/finer accordion fibre filter and a UV system... and it turned browny-green. Then the summer came and it got toasty warm the koi suffered, and it turned very very green (again). Plus the bottom, rocks, sides, $85,000 water-feature statue etc... got coated in green. So they got fed up, removed the fish and chlorinated it to hell in about 2004, and it has been like this since. Aged. Cured.... Sterile (Aug/Sept, 2010)



The villa wraps around on three sides but it's exposed to direct sunshine at/around mid-day. The roof is guttered, so only direct-fall rain gets into it. Pond is 29'x14.5' by about 18", which comes to about 4500US Gallons. Both inlet and outlet for the pump/filter are in the bottom right-hand corer, leading to pump-room behind the photographer. Pump-room is about 30' away from intake a little down hill, so at about the same level. Rocks and water-feature will be/have been removed and chlorination has stopped since this photo. Note the vertical edge edge, to be planted with mosses & ferns & bromeliad & orchid (need suggestions on this).

The villa is/was under refurbishment which we were trying to be concurrent with. So we drained the system by enough to start to re-set the ecosystem (about 6" deep) and still be able to redo the plumbing intakes/outlets and started introducing base-flora & fauna like snails (1000mystery plus everything else I could get, some plants & lilies and rubbish-guppies from a local pond: lesson learned- DO NOT DO THIS. Concrete dust from the refurbishment was chronic and construction (*&&$@!!) people can't be trusted to not sweep every blessed thing into the system or clean their paint-brushes in it. Lost just about every snail and plant but for this rockstar lily but the guppies went.... crazy. Had maybe >10000 in 2.5 months and all new colour patterns. And heaps of dragonflies and no mosquitoes. (Oct-Nov, 2010).


What we started with... note the sweepings coming in from the far end.

So... after much rum-addled thought, discussion, Q&A & trial and error we ordered 25 slatted wooden planters, an "Alita 60" air pump and a bead filter & low-draw pump good for 6000Gal, re-set all the in-ground plumbing to 4" with 2" reducers fittings at the ends and got in the wee-jeep to collect plants.


This is Ryan with the new outlet/drain to run just under the surface along the front of the system, just in front of the photographer in the above shots. It's 4" drain with mozzie-netting wrapped around it set with spray-glue and a little bit of PVC cement, just in case. Worked like a charm. We ended up painting it grey and smearing sand all over it to match the concrete pond.... which I'm not sure I'd do again as the paint took a week to dry. Also, i'd make the spaces/holes way bigger as leaves & finer junk plug these holes (!!!) in the running system. (from now on Dec 2010)


Here's the pressure-return pipe, a 20' length of 2" pressure, perforated with saw-cuts all the way along with a 4"-2" reducer in the tree at the right and a 2" length of flexible 2" pressure (from hot-tub store!) to get it into position along the right-hand wall in the first shots. Painted grey with sand rubbed in.


The end of the pressure-return, cut at a bias to diffuse the flow a bit. Make this bias much much steeper/stronger as the water just came out in a straight line.


Here's the re-fit to the old plumbing, with inlets and outlets at about the same points as before, re-done with 4" pipe (was 1" pressure, 3" drain). Pressure-return reducer will fit to the left-hand 4" and the flex will take it to the run along the bottom. Perforated drain will attach parallel to the water-surface along that wall via a 90-bend. The little 1" inlet is for the air-line and the concrete box on top is the entombment for the surface overflow drain and will be blocked over. You can see it's outlet in the garden behind.

Planters & Bubblers:

Here's Ryan with the planter-box. It's a timber box made of a local wood called "broadleaf" which is related to almond and very tough... and hopefully also tough in water. They are screwed together with simple steel screws sealed in liquid-nail- in future I'd probably just go for stainless screws, but they were stupid expensive. Ryan is gluing heavy geotextile to the panels to as the slatted sides are to allow water-flow to/through the planter. Don't use white silicone to seal the visible screw-heads, as we've done here- it's so white it looks radioactive, particularly once the wood is wet. Note the perforated plastic funnels in the basket. To do this again I'd use plastic mozzie screen in stead of geotextile as it's way cheaper and allows better water passage.


Here's a detail of the planter/filter. A ceramic air-stone is epoz'd into the bottom-middle and plumbed with pipe, then a perforated funnel is epoxy'd over it to turn the whole thing into a bubble-filter.



And the finished product. Note: make the pipe from stone to outside much much longer as it's a nightmare to work with underwater if it's too short- like this. Note the white segment of pipe to bring the bubbles & rising water to the soil surface. Use a good glue that will work for both plastics and cap it with masking tape (unlike what we've done here) to keep gravel & junk out.


And the plants... collected from all over the island. Lilies (3-4 types/colours) emergents incl. reeds, papyrus, cress & hyacinth, stringy submergents (don't know- see photos below) and a heap of lotus seeds plus a bunch more. The big lily is a Ja endemic (apparently) and has a flower like a dinner-plate. We made long and short planters too, as you can see in this pic. They didn't have bubblers though as I (& the island, apparently) ran out of cheep plastic funnels. The bag in the water is local charcoal. It'd been on soak like this for about 2 weeks. The pump-room is that stone wall behind the two fellas way at the back- thus the 4" in-ground piping as the run is the best part of a 50'.


Ryan setting the planters: a layer of busted charcoal up to just below the funnel top to keep water moving in and through, a layer of "choir" coconut fiber then a layer of good topsoil then finally 1-2" of course gravel to hold it all together. The small planters are in the background- they're just a little fibre and topsoil and gravel, without bubbler and specific to the stringy submergent plants. You can see some of them in the water at Ryan's feet.


And the planter with fibre. Note the electrical tape cap on the air-line. This keeps crud out of the air-stone once it goes into the water, but didn't really work as the line was way (way way) too short.



And with topsoil, ready for the gravel. Note how well (badly) the fibre compresses.


And the first set of out-plants. Note the little planters in the front-left. The system is still filling so everything looks.... cramped. The 1" airline is painted & cemented to the wall in the background and was plumbed in via 4-way splitters at the pond-bottom.


Bigger, while filling. That flower sure pleased the client, winning us a lot of browny-points I'm using up right now


And the end of day-2. Everything's essentially in place with bubblers going (you can see them- well excessive) but for the primary filter. Next step was to put epiphytes around that cut-stone edge.... which didn't work and I'll need some advice about.


Here's the finished(ish) product in January, after the filter has got a handle on the primary dust... though the bottom is still dusty. Rainbows about to go in.


One of two bags of rainbowfish (N=75). Ordered 100 neon dwarf, but the breeder brought what (I'm guessing) he thought I should have- 5 or 7 species, please feel free to ID. Rather than have the argument I re-set the price (as a grouchy customer should) to 80-cents per and took 'em. Also picked up 30 pearl danio and one little straggler orange neon zebra danio from a friend's shop. Hoping for rampant reproduction ('cept for the lone zebra). This was first week of January, 2011.


The submergent plants and planters, with lilies & papyrus in the background. These have since basically matted out the area, so I'm not sure I'd use such good soil in future... Water is crystal though.


And tooting my own horn... Plants and roots are growing through the planter geotextile already... not sure if that's good or bad, but it's pretty groovy.


Here's the middle February, 2011. Rainbows are schooling and looking great, with territories occurring in that bare spot in the front. There were some lovely turquoise ones that came looking very poorly (some dead), but they've found their spot in the main current and have beefed up and grown. The perforated drain pipe is along the wall just under the hyacinth along the left/back wall. Note the filamentous green algae in the middle- it only happens here and at another bubble-planter and is from the good soil used- the submergent plants suck all nutrients out of the water before this stuff can grow anywhere else. But what to do about it? Suggestions? Right now the gardener is raking it out and I'm expecting it to stop as the system & planter matures.


Same day, same spot, different angle. Can you see fish? I can't... The reeds and papyrus I was worried about as they would be trying to grow in 8" of water- which seemed deep. However these are mainly new growth so I guess they're OK with the depth. Oddly enough the dragonflies have disappeared since the rainbows went in- I can't imagine a rainbow could take on a nymph, but I guess they can get pretty serious.


You should be able to see a rainbow sitting proud at the far end of the gravel in this shot- if you squint. They're looking fantastic- growing and schooling and sparkling.

Now that you've got the background- to questions.
1) The algae. suggestions?
2) The plants around the dry edge- I've crazy-glued a couple of types of bromeliad, ferns and other plants that I've picked from the river-side stones and either the glue gives up before the plant gets going or the plants dry out. Suggestions? Or do I just wait for the rainy season and re-set everything? Some have taken, but it's looking patchy.
3) Stocking- I love it as it is, but the client is asking for bigger/niftier. Initial thoughts were to red-fin giant gourami but they'll eat off the plants. Currenlty thinking of 5x silver arowana and 25x clown-loach, but am worried about aro committing hari-kari (leaping) since the wall-plants didn't take very well and the lily-pad carpet isn't as complete or as dense as I'd have liked to guard against this. Also there is the issue of candles around the edges at night- they bring plenty of bugs, but will the aro leap into them and onto the deck? I'm hoping the snails will breed enough to keep ahead of the loaches, and the trophic cascade between rainbows and aros will break down as the aros get big. I'm also worried about the loaches eating off all the rainbow & danio eggs...
Option #2 would be one or three Fahaka puffers and be done with it. Good colour, good size, great personality... but potential for rental guest toe-nibbling.
Option #3, and my favourite option, would be to leave it as-is with the rainbows and maybe a couple of big synodont-cats to keep the bottom sediment moving... or maybe a stingray or two, but the potential for guest injury if they get in drunk has to be considered.
Unfortunately the clowns need to school, so minimum 6-10 which will have an impact on snails and fish-eggs... and they grow sooooo sloooowly.

Suggestions? Needs to be pretty/interesting from the surface and pretty big & non-herbivorous and largely self-feeding within this ecosystem (fish, terrestrial, surface and nymph bugs, snails), but must eventually overgrow eating rainbows/danios to be (essentially) hand-fed by the cook (prawns & lobster-bits & fish-heads primarily) and otherwise be super low-maintenance. There are some limits as to what I can import, primarily based on invasive-potenital.
Resistance to or wariness of cane-toad (egg & tadpole) poison would also be good as this system packs out with the beggars.
Thanks for your time, the floor is open.

I've essentially built the ecosystem for clowns- heaps of FW clams & mussels & prawns & worms and 5 species of snails and rocket circular current along the bottom around the back wall. Last step before we put the fish in will be to put in 100x 1' bamboo sections to keep everything complicated. I'm kinda curious to see how big they can get in 12-months.
IME the key to clowns (& botia in general) is current -heaps of current- and varied diet. Everything from kibble to crayfish-bits to cantaloupe to carrots.

Thanks folks.
Muske, I think you're absolutely right about the soil- excessive.
I'm up there tomorrow to finish the setup (rest of the pea-gravel, hook up the filter's blower, 100x bamboo sections etc...) and will get a few hundred MTS from the golf-course on the way up. I'll will take a few photos of filter/pump room and some underwater shots of the fish & system before I put in the filthy new gravel. The box-pots are on risers 0.5-1" above the bottom, so there's some snail-refugia, plus the gravel & plants & bamboo & leaves etc...
Soon come.

30&31C in the summertime- high-fin sharks would cook as the Koi did in the original system. Red-tail sharks maybe though, and they'd look great from above.

Muske,
I was out there on Wed last week. The water was still clear & the fish are coming on nicely but I'm noting that local gambusia and limia are building and overrunning the much prettier guppies- which is annoying, but the Aro should take care of that. There were eggs in the algae & plants, though I don't know if they were rainbow or danio: big (2mm) and orange with a yellow embryo. There were a heap of clear ones as well- probably rainbow, which is encouraging. Didn't see any juveniles that I could be sure weren't live-breeders, but the assumption would be reasonable. I put in heaps more gravel which should help with spawning.


The dreaded green stuff- and toadpoles. The rainbowfish aren't eating them (toadpoles), which hopefully means the imported fish won't either. Once everything is established and Aro are maybe 6" long I'll cut 1" gashes in the mesh over the draw intake holes to let it suck in the toadpoles- they're a primary thing/foulant in the mesh right now and the filter should remove a good 30% of them per cohort.


Clear water. Livebreeders everywhere, a rainbow in the background (ran from camera) and danio in the foreground.

Emergents are doing nicely and some of the lotus look like they might make it, but the lilies are not doing brilliantly. The big (white) one has declined some but the yellow and purple are holding steady and flowering, but not spreading and we need more surface coverage with summer coming. Water is getting to about 29-30C already and I'm wondering if that's the problem with the lilies. Lack of lily-shade is also brining the green filamentous algae on strong but I'm loath to pull it out as we're trying to set an ecosystem that will consume it through overabundance of herbivores. I did have to pull a bunch out and it was absolutely gritty with juvenile snails- which suggests this is happening. That's also where I saw a lot of the eggs.


Another rainbow in the background, plus gambusia, limia and guppy. I managed to hand-nab one of the "new" mutant guppy males to get a look: orange spots were there still but otherwise jet back with a jet black lyre-tail and blue sheen- quite lovely. Sorry, no picture and now I'm kicking myself for not brining it home... though it'd have cooked in the bottle on the drive home (AC is on the fritz). Is this special? Any buyers


After adding new gravel- so the water's a little murky. Not a) the decline of the giant white lily in the foreground corner b) the lack of green filamentous algae around/under these (remaining) lilies and the strong little emergent lotus leaf under the right-hand front papyrus (yahoo!!... knock wood). I'm hoping that the decline of the giant white lily is shock from re-planting and that it will come back. That or over-temperature. If it's already root-bound in that 36"x18" container I'm in trouble...

Muske, I'm not going to admit defeat and screw with the soil and planters until the snails get moving & take effect. I've been experimenting with this stuff (the algae) at home and snails will overpopulate and eat it out, so we'll see if we can get this to happen on the much larger scale with way more sunshine... and eventually loaches.


The pump-room. A damed mess, which I've complained about to the managers. Backwashing is happening irregularly at best, the flex-tube from pump to filter has 2 bends in stead of the one long bend I designed it with and they've not mounted the wall-braket for the air pump (at least it's still above water-level). It was nice and tidy when we signed it over...
I reckon a good piece of the algae issue is the lack of back-washing and top-ups keeping water level high and filter/flow efficient.
To do this again I'd use the same pump & filter (plenty of flow... if it gets minimal maintenance) but I'd use the Alita 40 pump rather than this 60. A little too much air...

There's at least one small FW crab in there now, which is positive and groovy. And due to my lack of vigilance there are also at least 2 local FW prawns in there, which is very very bad (heavy-duty predator). Loosing an occasional self-replacing small fish to these (*&&$#$!!) things is OK, but the imports are costly and won't self-replicate for a good few years... and only if we're very lucky. Fortunately, these prawns are tasty and dumb, so a simple wire-mesh trap and a squashed land-snail should do the trick- I've passed on the design to the landscapers. Loaches will tidy up any juveniles once the adults are gone. There is also a population of bright red "earth worm" looking annelids in the gravel. Would these be red-wrigglers or something else? They're not polychaetes or leaches and look different than any earthworm I've seen before- long breeding patch and a very bright red. I always thought earthworms drown. The one I dug up was about 3" long, but there were little soil mounds all through the gravel. I threw it back in and the fish pecked at it, but didn't seem to recognize it as food. Having said that, they barely reacted to good pellet food either, so it seems the fish are very well fed.

Will keep you posted. I was preferring the small-and-bright-fish-only set up, but I'm well looking forward to the imports now...

Any thoughts on keeping the arowana from leaping to their doom with the low lip on this system? I'm starting with 10 to end up with the 5 less "athletic" & skittish fish after maybe 18 months, but would welcome any input.