Is it ok to . . .
- Thread starter djarmstrong
- Start date
Muske;2824606; said:
Im not talking about my shed pond as thats not up and running yet , this about my front garden Goldfish and back garden Koi pond
Gr8KarmaSF;2824802; said:
Front pond 35+ goldfish and a few Frogs .
Back pond 10 Koi .
Hey djarmstrong, if your Dad's friend is only running a mechanical filter, he can get away with shutting it off.
What kind of filter do you have on the ponds?
A biological filter is a completely different story. The bacteria in a biological filter start to die off after flow has stopped for 20 minutes (this nothing to be concerned about as it's just a little bit). After one hour it has escalated and is now a problem and circulations needs to be restarted. At 4 hours the filter should be flushed before being put back into service. If it was off for 16 hrs the unit should be broken down and cleaned and recycled.
Your gonna hear alot of grat stories on here about different peoples experiences so I suggest you do some research on the life ccyle and what it takes to sustain benefical bacteria that is house in a pond / aquarium filter.
Find out what kind of filter the friend has too, so your comparing apples to apples.
And I wouldn't argue with your Dad, but a good discussion is definately ok.
Dr Joe
.
What kind of filter do you have on the ponds?
A biological filter is a completely different story. The bacteria in a biological filter start to die off after flow has stopped for 20 minutes (this nothing to be concerned about as it's just a little bit). After one hour it has escalated and is now a problem and circulations needs to be restarted. At 4 hours the filter should be flushed before being put back into service. If it was off for 16 hrs the unit should be broken down and cleaned and recycled.
Your gonna hear alot of grat stories on here about different peoples experiences so I suggest you do some research on the life ccyle and what it takes to sustain benefical bacteria that is house in a pond / aquarium filter.
Find out what kind of filter the friend has too, so your comparing apples to apples.
And I wouldn't argue with your Dad, but a good discussion is definately ok.
Dr Joe
.
Dr Joe;2826686; said:Hey djarmstrong, if your Dad's friend is only running a mechanical filter, he can get away with shutting it off.
What kind of filter do you have on the ponds?
A biological filter is a completely different story. The bacteria in a biological filter start to die off after flow has stopped for 20 minutes (this nothing to be concerned about as it's just a little bit). After one hour it has escalated and is now a problem and circulations needs to be restarted. At 4 hours the filter should be flushed before being put back into service. If it was off for 16 hrs the unit should be broken down and cleaned and recycled.
Your gonna hear alot of grat stories on here about different peoples experiences so I suggest you do some research on the life ccyle and what it takes to sustain benefical bacteria that is house in a pond / aquarium filter.
Find out what kind of filter the friend has too, so your comparing apples to apples.
And I wouldn't argue with your Dad, but a good discussion is definately ok.
Dr Joe
.
On the front pond we are running one - Hozelock Ecoclear 5500 and two of the same on the back pond .
I run my moderately stocked pond in the afternoon only. Plants and sand keep it pretty clear on their own so the filter is mainly used to catch the little bit of floating leaves and it has a carbon element in it to filter out any stuff that the plants fail to catch.
Most people on here would probably disagree with that but it seems to work, and I've got a fair number of large fish in there including a giant gourami and four oscars. So far so good. Surely if you have the balance right in your pond the filter shouldn;t be the be all and end all? I've seen wild Koi in lakes and rivers in China that I wouldn't even put my toe into and they seemed fine.
Why not experiment? Run the filters a few hours a day and monitor the fish and water. If something negative happens you have the evidence you need to convince your dad to run the filters 24/7 and if nothing happens and the fish are ok your dad will be happy with the bill and you'll still have happy fish. What's the worst that could happen? I doubt the fish will run away.
Most people on here would probably disagree with that but it seems to work, and I've got a fair number of large fish in there including a giant gourami and four oscars. So far so good. Surely if you have the balance right in your pond the filter shouldn;t be the be all and end all? I've seen wild Koi in lakes and rivers in China that I wouldn't even put my toe into and they seemed fine.
Why not experiment? Run the filters a few hours a day and monitor the fish and water. If something negative happens you have the evidence you need to convince your dad to run the filters 24/7 and if nothing happens and the fish are ok your dad will be happy with the bill and you'll still have happy fish. What's the worst that could happen? I doubt the fish will run away.
djarmstrong;2828058; said:
Good pond filter, the biologicals will die off if it isn't run 24/7 tho so it would only be a mechanical then.
Any plants in the pond? Got any pix?
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DubaiPond;2828167; said:I run my moderately stocked pond in the afternoon only. Plants and sand keep it pretty clear on their own so the filter is mainly used to catch the little bit of floating leaves and it has a carbon element in it to filter out any stuff that the plants fail to catch.
Most people on here would probably disagree with that but it seems to work, and I've got a fair number of large fish in there including a giant gourami and four oscars. So far so good. Surely if you have the balance right in your pond the filter shouldn;t be the be all and end all? I've seen wild Koi in lakes and rivers in China that I wouldn't even put my toe into and they seemed fine.
Why not experiment? Run the filters a few hours a day and monitor the fish and water. If something negative happens you have the evidence you need to convince your dad to run the filters 24/7 and if nothing happens and the fish are ok your dad will be happy with the bill and you'll still have happy fish. What's the worst that could happen? I doubt the fish will run away.
Need to post water chemistry #'s for your pond, and as far as the China senario...muddy / algae water doesn't mean bad water.
Experiment? If they shut the pump down for one day, the filter needs to be recycled (30 days maybe?). If there isn't enough biological material in the pond to take up the slack, it will quickly spiral out of control and if they are lucky, they'll get a bad case of 'green water' which will help with overload of nutrients.
Dr Joe
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Pump = NurseryPro 4500
I second the dirty ponds in China/Japan. Some of the best fish come from mud bottom ponds.
I second the dirty ponds in China/Japan. Some of the best fish come from mud bottom ponds.
Dr Joe;2828465; said:
No pictures , sorry .
Front pond - has 3 out of 4 sides full of plants , including - Marsh Caltha palustris , Equisetum Japonicum , Juncus Effusus Soft Rush , and alot more around the sides which i cannt remeber at the moment plus a Lilly in the bottom too .
Back pond - No plants really , apart from a large clump of Elodea Densa
Talking from a koi point of view, they color up a lot more in mud ponds.Muske;2828478; said:
From a filter point of view I shut down the pond filter back in November, I'm not adding fish until the spring and will be running the bio for a good month before the fish go in. I can't see any benefit from turning them off, only if you could isolate other filters(chambers) and leave the bio running.
