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The pond pump was acting up, so right before I got sick I pulled it out and had a good look, and it wasn't fixable.
So I ordered a new one, then was too sick to put it all together. So it has been sitting here for a few days. Yesterday B asked if he could set it up if I told him what to do. Fortunately, I had already assembled everything up- and down-stream of the pump, so it was pretty easy. He stuck it all together, I roughly leveled the biofilter, and it was good to go.
I think the old pump had been declining for awhile, they usually slow down before they fail entirely, and the new one is the same model and speed but pumping much more quickly.
When I pulled the pump out to dismantle it, I took that opportunity to dismantle the biofilter and rinse the media, and replace the hoses with new, longer ones. I replaced the hoses because the last time I had to reconfigure things, they ended up a bit short, and because I've never been crazy about the way this particular setup was configured. I bought replacement hoses months ago and have been waiting to have time/energy/weather to get it done. The pump dying was a good time to do it.
When I bought the old pump in 2017, I didn't have a lot of hose, so it ended up configured with the pump sitting right underneath the biofilter, and a longer hose connecting that to the prefilter. Last time it got messed with, the pump ended up suspended off the floor of the pond, so the prefilter was also suspended, and that doesn't do a good job grabbing debris. It also meant that any pump maintenance required pulling out the whole biofilter (which is why I kept putting off pulling out the pump and replacing the hoses because what a pain in the butt!) Now the pump and the prefilter are both on the floor, at the opposite end of the pond from the biofilter. Much better. I can easily pull the pump out when needed.
Once I am no longer sick, I will start stirring up the debris on the bottom of the pond every few days, so that the prefilter can grab it, and cleaning the prefilterevery few days also. Less work for me in the long run.
Last fall a local woman gave me some duckweed and some mosquito fish; all of my fish but one had mysteriously died. Which was kind of sad, because I got my original fish in 2006 and all of the fish in my pond were descended from those. They were so tame, they would swim into my hands. I don't know what happened, why they didn't make it through the summer. She gave me about 5 fish and a bunch of duckweed. The duckweed is doing great and has really helped clear the pond. (In May we had about three weeks of solid heavy rain and no joke, there was duckweed growing EVERYWHERE in the yard!) At first the fish she gave me were skittish, but now there's a whole school or juveniles who aren't afraid of me or B.
In 2017 I replaced my plastic filter media with LECA. I don't think LECA is as good a medium, in terms of effectiveness, but I do think it's safer than the plastic medium (which shrank over time, and that made me uncomfortable. Where was it going?) It may be that the power of the pump is too strong, but I am hoping that later this year we will have a larger pond, in the ground, so it will all work out. I didn't want to move back to a lower-powered pump because I would have to replace all the fittings/plumbing again, this was easier.
So I ordered a new one, then was too sick to put it all together. So it has been sitting here for a few days. Yesterday B asked if he could set it up if I told him what to do. Fortunately, I had already assembled everything up- and down-stream of the pump, so it was pretty easy. He stuck it all together, I roughly leveled the biofilter, and it was good to go.
I think the old pump had been declining for awhile, they usually slow down before they fail entirely, and the new one is the same model and speed but pumping much more quickly.
When I pulled the pump out to dismantle it, I took that opportunity to dismantle the biofilter and rinse the media, and replace the hoses with new, longer ones. I replaced the hoses because the last time I had to reconfigure things, they ended up a bit short, and because I've never been crazy about the way this particular setup was configured. I bought replacement hoses months ago and have been waiting to have time/energy/weather to get it done. The pump dying was a good time to do it.
When I bought the old pump in 2017, I didn't have a lot of hose, so it ended up configured with the pump sitting right underneath the biofilter, and a longer hose connecting that to the prefilter. Last time it got messed with, the pump ended up suspended off the floor of the pond, so the prefilter was also suspended, and that doesn't do a good job grabbing debris. It also meant that any pump maintenance required pulling out the whole biofilter (which is why I kept putting off pulling out the pump and replacing the hoses because what a pain in the butt!) Now the pump and the prefilter are both on the floor, at the opposite end of the pond from the biofilter. Much better. I can easily pull the pump out when needed.
Once I am no longer sick, I will start stirring up the debris on the bottom of the pond every few days, so that the prefilter can grab it, and cleaning the prefilterevery few days also. Less work for me in the long run.
Last fall a local woman gave me some duckweed and some mosquito fish; all of my fish but one had mysteriously died. Which was kind of sad, because I got my original fish in 2006 and all of the fish in my pond were descended from those. They were so tame, they would swim into my hands. I don't know what happened, why they didn't make it through the summer. She gave me about 5 fish and a bunch of duckweed. The duckweed is doing great and has really helped clear the pond. (In May we had about three weeks of solid heavy rain and no joke, there was duckweed growing EVERYWHERE in the yard!) At first the fish she gave me were skittish, but now there's a whole school or juveniles who aren't afraid of me or B.
In 2017 I replaced my plastic filter media with LECA. I don't think LECA is as good a medium, in terms of effectiveness, but I do think it's safer than the plastic medium (which shrank over time, and that made me uncomfortable. Where was it going?) It may be that the power of the pump is too strong, but I am hoping that later this year we will have a larger pond, in the ground, so it will all work out. I didn't want to move back to a lower-powered pump because I would have to replace all the fittings/plumbing again, this was easier.