Need advice for large pond maintenance. Locating pump inlet/better pump/plant control

[Tokay]

My friend recently bought a house that came with a huge pond but no information on it (not sold by whoever built the pond). Helping him work on it and needed some advice.

It is a two part pond, small waterfall to a ~10x6x2' deep pond above ground on the patio. Overflows to large in ground pond behind the house 20' at longest point and 10' at widest. Pretty good size. There is a pump in the ground to the side of that pond that sucks water from the bottom of the large pond, to a large circular sand/bead filter, then it drains into the waterfall and top pond. Lots of frogs, fish, all types of plants, decor, etc. A pond company estimated it at $15,000 to $20,000 to build.

Three main problems.
1. We can't find the inlet for the pump. The pump is in the ground on the side of the pond and the piping goes somewehere to the bottom of the pond. It is long, has an odd shape and the plants block most of the view.

2. The pump was recently replaced for some reason and they installed a large pool pump. It is way to strong, causing the water fall and top pond to overfill and leak out the sides. It is also sucking up plants and frogs because we can't find the inlet to check if there is a screen of cover on it.

3. The plants are taking over. Lilly pads, long grass, bushy stuff, a little bit of everthing.

Any advice on how to find the intlet for the pump? I was thinking while im working on the pump i could run air in reverse and see if i can find where it bubbles in the pond. Then i could put a screen or cover on it.

Any recommendation on pump brands or styles? I have no idea what size or type they were running on the pond before but i plan to sell the pool pump and run a decent pond pump with a built in pre filter. And if its too strong i will have it overflow into the bottom pond. The rubber pond liner is short at spots around the waterfall and top pond, so with too much water flow it will leak.

The plants have taken over %70 or more of the bottom pond. I plan to cut/remove a decent amount. Ive done some research on maintenance/removal of pond plants. Any advice? Is it possible to remove to much ?

Thank you for your time, i will have pictures up next time.

 

[kendragon]

Rule of thumb for turn over rate is one time per hour. So a 3000 gal pond would require a 3000 gph pump. To save energy cost, the lower the amps the better. A sediment chamber before the pump works best with planted ponds.

 

[Tokay]

I'll have to measure and see how many gallons the pond is and try to make sure it turns over once per hour.
Could you recommend any brands?

 

[kendragon]

I use Wave pumps. I run them on my tanks too.

 

[Tokay]

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Here are some before pictures of my friends pond. After working on it for some time, I could tell that the pond had not be cared for in sometime. Around a year maybe.

The sellers of the house replaced the original pump (said it was broken) with a 3/4 hp pentair SF N1 pool pump. It was too strong and causing the top pond and waterfall to overflow. We put a T and valve after the sand filter and had the excess water drain back into the lower pond.

Everything was overgrown in the pond, especially the long grass vine stuff. The roots had grown so large they had surrounded pots, large rocks, etc. By the time we were done there was a very large mound of plants, roots and crap. I couldn't estimate the weight.

Next was the supposed to be the hardest part, finding the inlet to the pump on the bottom off the pond.The basket on the pond was always filling up with debris/animals like there was no pre filter. I wore a flying fishing jumpsuit (the waterproof overalls) to help remove all the excess plant growth. When i started to look for the inlet i was lucky enough to take a lucky step and felt the suction on my foot. Whatever pre filter type fittings wasn't there anymore and i couldn’t find it need by (because it was so deep and cloudy for cleaning). I tried to feel it with my hand, there wasn't any threads, but it also wasn't slip. Hopefully we can find whatever pre filter it had somewhere in the pond. For now i put a large screen bucket over the pipe with a rock on top to prevent any debris from being sucked up.The pre filter on the pump has been clean, so it must be working.

Looking over the large triton tagelus sand filter (label was faded from the sun) we could see it wasn't even on and needed to be back flushed and turned back on.

The last problem was the mosquito larva that began to grown. When the new pump was installed and causing the top area to overflow, it drained the bottom pond (i think this happened twice). Killing many of the fish, frogs and other life in the pond that would eat them. They restricted the pump to decrease flow to the top pond, along with all the excess plants made many area of the pond still. After removing the plants and diverting water back to the bottom pond you could see water moving around most of the pond and removed 90% of the still spots.

The pond looked 10x better after and way more water circulating.
I believe its about 4000-6000+/- gallons total. I need to try to get an average LxWxD (oddly shaped, almost like a pool)
Many of the rocks around the liner had fallen in, dead plants in rocks around pond and also in stream between upper and lower pond.
We still have a lot of work to do.

1. I need to calculate the size of the pond to see what kind of pump it will need.
2. Still looking for a decent brand/model pump for the pond.
3. There is a lot of muck/debris on the bottom of the pond. Ill need to build a diy muck vacuum so we can start removing all the muck over time.
4. The pond liner is a little short in some parts. Two parts of the water fall and one of the sides where the top pond overflows into the bottom pond.

Im going to take an average length of things to try to calculate size.
The previous pump was black and had a large blue screen basket pre filter. Ive been researching large pumps that have a decent basket, cost effective and decent reviews. I believe it should run 24/7 and doesn't have to be super strong because the top pond will overfill anyways (untill waterfall and upper pond is redone).
Ive been looking up some DIY muck vacuums and stuff. Ill prob rig up one of my external pumps to a trash can with some filter media. See if i can get it to settle at the bottom and try to pump clear water back in from the top.
The best/only way to repair short pond liner is to replace it right?

Thanks for checking out the post everyone.

 

[Tokay]

Here are before pics, other ones weren't working right.

 

[cubanboy1538]

im buildn a pond right now and im going to use a sequence pump. the sequence is a good brand that got named when i asked companies about pumps (like my skimmer and filter companies) . for the inlet have u tried looking on the bottom? because it might be a bottom drain. if not i guess you will have to just get in the pond and feel around. u shuld find it soon because it sounds like you have a lot of flow. u may also want to dig up the lilypads and stick them in pots so they dont spread. hope this helped

 

[koienterprise]

Here is a simple calculator that will help calculate your TDH and make an educated choice on pump size for your system. http://www.koienterprise.com/Total-Dynamic-Head-Calculator.html
You may want to open that sand/bead filter and see what type of media is really inside. Depending on media you may need a high RPM pump to produce the pressure needed to drive flow through the filter. If it contains sand I would highly suggest you change out the media and do a convertion. This will save you on an engery hogging pump and go with a more effecient pump like mentioned above "Wave"!
http://www.koienterprise.com/External-Pond-Pumps-c-111.html

 

[davidbanks]

Here is a simple calculator that will help calculate your TDH and make an educated choice on pump size for your system. http://www.koienterprise.com/Total-Dynamic-Head-Calculator.html
You may want to open that sand/bead filter and see what type of media is really inside. Depending on media you may need a high RPM pump to produce the pressure needed to drive flow through the filter. If it contains sand I would highly suggest you change out the media and do a convertion. This will save you on an engery hogging pump and go with a more effecient pump like mentioned above "Wave"!
http://www.koienterprise.com/External-Pond-Pumps-c-111.html

Great information! It will be supportive to everyone who utilizes it, including myself. This post just saved me a lot of looking around. Thanks for sharing the info.