Well, I don't think I've ever given a walk through of how I filter my pond. So here we go! Just figured I'd share with the MFK community who have been ever so helpful these past months. So enjoy, learn, ask, copy, whatever!
The water starts by flowing through my 1.5" newly installed blue bulkhead. I attached an arm to the bulkhead so I can adjust the strainer height simply by turning clock or counter clockwise.
Water then flows to the pump via 1.5" PVC pipe and 45 degree elbows (for less pressure loss).
Water enters my dolphin 3900 external pump, through some more PVC and 45 degree elbows into the top of my "bio tower."
Here the water meets a bunch of dish scrubbers (prefilter) on top of the first drip tray. The purpose of this drip tray is to disperse the water evenly down across the filter pad in the middle of the container.
The water then obviously travels through the filter pad. Below the filter pad is an extra piece of PVC and egg crate laid down simply to hold the filter pad above the second drip tray (the bottom and 1-2" up the sides of the container). I did this because I didn't want the filter pad clogging the holes.
Once the water meets the bottom of the first container it drips across a ton of lava rock. There is also about 5-6" of submerged lava rock at all times in the bottom of the sump. I always have water depth in the bottom due to the placement of the bulkheads for the return lines.
This residual water also allowed me to hook up a 250 gph powerhead with some PVC tubing to the stock tank I placed next to the pond. I kept my koi in there for a while. It's going to be my smaller fish/injured fish hospital tank. It's currently drained, but whatever I find next will probably inhabit it for a while. Then I just installed a 1" bulkhead and a return line from the 65 gallon stock tank. Worked like a charm.
Then, as an experiment, the water also feeds some plants at the far end of my sump. I know it's not much compared to total water volume for nitrate removal, I just want to see if they'll grow first.
My turnover is roughly 7x an hour.
Hope these pics help tell the story! And I hope I hit everything.
Thanks for reading!
The water starts by flowing through my 1.5" newly installed blue bulkhead. I attached an arm to the bulkhead so I can adjust the strainer height simply by turning clock or counter clockwise.
Water then flows to the pump via 1.5" PVC pipe and 45 degree elbows (for less pressure loss).
Water enters my dolphin 3900 external pump, through some more PVC and 45 degree elbows into the top of my "bio tower."
Here the water meets a bunch of dish scrubbers (prefilter) on top of the first drip tray. The purpose of this drip tray is to disperse the water evenly down across the filter pad in the middle of the container.
The water then obviously travels through the filter pad. Below the filter pad is an extra piece of PVC and egg crate laid down simply to hold the filter pad above the second drip tray (the bottom and 1-2" up the sides of the container). I did this because I didn't want the filter pad clogging the holes.
Once the water meets the bottom of the first container it drips across a ton of lava rock. There is also about 5-6" of submerged lava rock at all times in the bottom of the sump. I always have water depth in the bottom due to the placement of the bulkheads for the return lines.
This residual water also allowed me to hook up a 250 gph powerhead with some PVC tubing to the stock tank I placed next to the pond. I kept my koi in there for a while. It's going to be my smaller fish/injured fish hospital tank. It's currently drained, but whatever I find next will probably inhabit it for a while. Then I just installed a 1" bulkhead and a return line from the 65 gallon stock tank. Worked like a charm.
Then, as an experiment, the water also feeds some plants at the far end of my sump. I know it's not much compared to total water volume for nitrate removal, I just want to see if they'll grow first.
My turnover is roughly 7x an hour.
Hope these pics help tell the story! And I hope I hit everything.
Thanks for reading!
