Koi Pond Maintenance

Koi pond and aquarium maintenance simplified. There is no need for a lot of work in order to keep you fish healthy and in a crystal clean environment.

Is Koi pond maintenance getting you down? Do you spend more time and money just trying to keep your pond clean and healthy? As a Koi pond owner, I understand what it is like to constantly clean your pond with little or no success. Just the amount of chemicals I have tried that promise a clear pond and don't work could fill a swimming pool. I often wonder what all these chemicals are doing to my fish and the surrounding environment.

Before building our pond I did extensive research into what kind of pump, filter and chemicals to use. The most widely recommended filtration system to use is Biological Filtration (Bio Bead). I would like to discuss my personal findings on this type of filtration system.

Biological filtration works on the theory that waste is trapped by the bio beads themselves and then flushed out when you backwash the filter. It also gives beneficial bacteria a place to grow. This beneficial bacteria is supposed to help eliminate algae and promote healthy levels of ph, nitrogen and phosphorus.

I have found that I never seem to be able to completely backwash all the waste from the filter. I think I get it clean and then start the system again and notice a cloud of debris being pumped back into my pond. This is after flushing tons of water onto the ground trying to clean the filter. Where I live we don't have well water and must pay for every drop we use leaving me with a hefty water bill and my pond still dirty.

Even though I have cleaned the filter as instructed, apparently the beneficial bacteria doesn't want to work for a place to stay because I still had algae. And of course the tons of chemicals I tried, failed to live up to my expectations. I thought that changing my bio beads (maybe they had worn out) would be the answer. It definitely answered one question about this type of filtration system, and that was that the lime and calcium in our water created a nasty cement like mixture in the filter, bonding the bio beads and the waste together. This prevented the system from working as it should.

Now what should I do? I couldn't change the water I use and I didn't want to install a filter on my filter. This left me floundering for a while. I finally decided to try a cartridge type filter like the ones used on swimming pools. This was the answer to my problems!

When it was time to clean the filters I took them out and blasted them with a hose. I was surprised not only by how much waste was trapped by the cartridge filter, but also how easy it was to clean them. I only used a fraction of the amount of water needed for back washing. Every once in a while I would soak the filters in a water and bleach solution in a trash can and rinse them out completely and they were as good as new.

I have found some new information about the bio bead filtration and why it's not as good as promised. Besides never getting all the debris out and the large amounts of water used to backwash, the beneficial bacteria which is supposed to eliminate algae is extremely fragile. If you shut off the system or have a power failure your beneficial bacteria dies. If the water flow is too fast or to slow it may die. If you are replacing water or doing a water change and your clean water contains any chlorine the bacteria will die. It takes approximately 6 - 7 weeks to grow a colony of bacteria large enough to do any good. You can purchase beneficial bacteria to add to the pond until your colony is large enough to do the work itself, but how do you know the bacteria you have purchased in the bottle is still alive. Needless to say I would much rather use a cartridge type filter that is effective, easy to maintain and I don't have to worry about it dying.

If you would like to find out more information about how to keep your Koi pond or aquarium clean and healthy then I would suggest you go to http://www.green-out.net. They have a lot of information to help make your pond experience fun instead of a nightmare. You can also find out about their new patented water clarifier that is safe for fish, pets and the environment by clicking here http://www.green-out.net/products.html

Article Tags: Pond Maintenance, Beneficial Bacteria