More water movement?

[Conner]

I'm wanting to add more water movement to my pond.

Its 3,500g, with an approximately 300g bog filter. The pond flows into a surface skimmer, and a 3,500gph pump sends the water up to the bog filter, where it rises up through the gravel and plants. The water then flows down a series of small waterfalls back into the pond on the opposite side of the pond from the skimmer.

This seems to be doing a pretty good job, but I don't think the deeper parts of the pond have very much flow. I'm debating between adding another water pump (1,000-2,000 gph) into the bottom of the pond, or using an air pump with 1 or more airstones suspended just off the bottom in front of the skimmer (the deepest point of the pond).

Right now the pond just has about 50 feeder comets in it, ranging from 2-4 inches in length. I am planning on trying to catch some of those out, and adding several larger goldfish and koi to the pond over the span of a few weeks or months.

What would you guys do?

 

[poisonXvenom]

Usually, you would want to double the rate of your pump of your pond size... I have a 4000 gallon pond and I have about 8,000gph pump running on it.

 

[scriving]

i would get rid of the goldfish koi idea and stock with locals

 

[bomber]

For more water movement, I am in the process of adding a disk to the bottom of my pond connected to my skimmer box with PVC pipes.

This way as the surface of my pond gets skimmed, that Disk laying at the bottom of my pond will get a free hitch to suck debris from the bottom of my pond.

I thought about making a purchase on those quiet one 4000 pumps and just leaving it at the bottom of the pond so the fish would have to really burn off their energy.

Eat 1/3 of the koi's body weight daily/Burn off energy by more water movement/drip system for clean water =
Big ass koi.
I might just buy this pump.

 

[Conner]

i would get rid of the goldfish koi idea and stock with locals

That was my plan, but we are hoping to sell the house later this summer, and koi look nicer to potential buyers than bluegill do...

Plus, if I go with the native theme, I'd be tossing in 5 shortnose gars, and those definitely wouldn't be kosher for a new owner. Although I guess I could always just fish them out again...

 

[Muske]

Airstones will be the cheapest. Look for a mini compressor to run 3-4 larger 2" round stones.

 

[Conner]

I may just go with the air stones instead of a pump, although I'm also looking at setting up a UV filter, so it might make more sense to get a water pump, and split the flow between the sterilizer and a mini fountain, or something like that.

Once I price different components out, I'll figure out what I'm gonna do.