How many of you have built, regularly build and/or maintain or are the owners/maintainers of Koi Ponds?
I’m not talking about a stock pond, an algae/duckweed collection in a dirt hole, a cattle waterer or anything with a rope swing, but a real Koi Pond.
What do you have and how is it stocked? How heavily is is stiocked? Good features? Bad features? If I could I would do this differently…
Replies
I'll get you some pictures of mine and some more info when i return later tonight gotta go
Don't cheap out on the materials. Some people think its just as easy as digging a hole and filling it with water...it aint.
Use a skimmer-filter it will really take all the leaves out of the water before they have a chance to sink and start rotting. Have a nice waterfall oppisite the filter it will push all the crud into it.
Do a bottom drain attached to the skimmer filter.
Buy the biggest bestest filter you can afford and that will fit your space. Or make one, the skimmer filter will take out the big stuff.
Make sure there is a way to clean your filter sensibly.
Use a UV filter also.
Figure out the shape of the pond and dig a little 4" deep by 12" wide trench all around the outside-do rebar and concrete. This will be edge of pond. Then dig out pond. Once liner is in you can mortar rocks to the little concrete 'footing' and have nice safe place for people to sit and watch the fish.
On pumps make sure you really know the pumping ability of the pump you are considering and really figure out the head so you know how much water is pumping thru your filter-one complete water change an hour I think is ideal. Also check the watts some pumps suck way more juice than others for the same amount of pumpage.
If you want healthy koi do the above-fancy goldfish are way hardier but still...don't cheap out on the equipment.
Daniel Neumansky
Restoring our second Victorian home this time in Alamdea CA. Check out the blog http://www.chezneumansky.blogspot.com/
Oakland CA
Crazy Homeowner-Victorian Restorer
While I appreciate the input, what I wanted to know is "Do you have a koi pond?" IF you do, I am interested your details and experience. How many gallons, how many fish, how big, what type of filtration do you have, how do you winter the pond, do you use pumped aeration, how much....
I did my research before construction and made my choices. My newly constructed pond is a 16,000 gallon skimmer/waterfall media fliter based system that has a 1 hour 20 minute turnover rate (200 gpm). It is 5 foot deep and has a 4 inch bottom drain. The only pics I have are high resolution and large files. One during construction is attached.
Waterfall/filter box is in the foreground, skimmer at the far end.
Edited 8/19/2008 9:34 am by Tim
You can reduce the picture file size with Irfanview, a free utility.http://www.irfanview.com
Wow, I offer good solid advice from experience and I get a snotty reply? You asked for advice about a project that is already done and then get pissed off when give you the benefit of my experience? I just re-read your first post and its really not clear that the job is already done...
I see from your pictures that your pond is surrounded by trees. You better have a strong surface flow to push all those leaves into the skimmer.
I see you have a dirt edge the first time some little kid is goofing around on those rocks and they let go you'll wish you had the concrete I mentioned in my post.
I had a 2,000 gallon pond, which we built ourselves along with the deck in the picture.
View Image
Its got a Savio skimmer filter with UV the pumps are in skimmer filter which pumps to a home made upflow-veggie filter in the right corner. In the lower pond which is 3' deep I keep Koi. In the upper pond which is 2.5' deep I keep fancy goldfish. There are 8 Koi most of them butterfly (they look better and are hardier) ranging in size from 6"-1.5' they keep breeding I'm going to have to sell some off. In the upper pond I have like 20 fancy goldfish.
Mentally change all those tenses to past as I sold the house last year to a friend but I'm still over there all the time helping him with the pond. We've got a deal that when I get my new pond up and running I'll get to take back half the original koi.
Daniel Neumansky
Restoring our second Victorian home this time in Alamdea CA. Check out the blog http://www.chezneumansky.blogspot.com/
Oakland CA
Crazy Homeowner-Victorian Restorer
Edited 8/19/2008 1:48 pm by madmadscientist
Daniel,
My bad, I apologize for my poor manners. I did say that I appreciated your input. I asked the equivalent of "How do like driving the new xxxx car?" and you replyed with how to build an engine! Sorry, I'm direct and impatient at times.
Your second post is much more informative and I appreciate that moreso. I do have a lot of trees and expect that my maintenance time will reflect that. That is simply the reality of living on a heavily wooded lot. I have made a lot of progress towards finishing the edges and landcaping and decking since that photo was taken. Concrete is not preferable, to me, but then neither are kids!
So how lond did your Koi take to get 18"? How long did you have them? What was you water chemistry like? I guess in Alameda, CA freezing is not much of a concern.
I have never heard that butterfly Koi are hardier than standard fin varieties. Is tha based on your experience or something you heard/read somewhere? Have you been keeping koi for long? I have not and I'm quite inerested.
Did you do anything specific to get the koi to breed?
That's a pretty big pond. Why the liner on that scale?
Typically around here they pack the bottom with clay.Not
much clay in Ill.?
I'll not add anything further since your pond is already finished except Koi are nothing more than carp and don't really require all that special attention as some say but they can be expensive. I have a friend who raises and sells them all over the world you can buy them a lot cheaper from him. i just added a 14" koi to my collection from him for $75 if your are interested i will hook you up with him. o yea to get them to breed all you need is a male and female and some vegitation.
Absolutely, I'm interested. Hook me up! I thought you were going to post a pic of your pond?
I'm still interested in the details of what you have and how it works. My pond is not finished, though I have selected the major system components and it is up and running.
Earlier this week, I just finished building an outdoor Koi tank. It's 8' X 12' X 3' (~2000 gallons) framed with 6X landscape timbers and lined with EDPM.A 3" bottom drain runs to a Sequence 4200 pump, a small Nexus filter (a sweet Craigslist find) and then branches into a UV filter (1" line, ~400gph) with the remainder running to a 100 gallon stock tank filter/waterfall (utilizing 2 rolls of Springflo and a "lid" of spun Polypro). I'll probably add a settling tank and a skimmer unit down the road.This is to take care of my 5 poor fish, who've spent the last 2 years in a 6' show tank. Now I'm looking forward to picking up some new fish at this years Washington Koi show! My previous waterfeature was a 1500 - 2000 gallon pond that had a gravel bog filter at the head of a 40' stream and a Savio skimmer at the pond tail. I dug every inch by hand, and hauled in 15 tons of granite a pickup load at a time. It was beautiful (we won a Pac NW magazine honorable mention), but at only 3' max. depth, with a 1' deep shelf around the edge, it was a highly productive heron fishery. Here's an oversized pic:http://mysite.verizon.net/imagelib/sitebuilder/misc/show_image.html?linkedwidth=actual&linkpath=http://mysite.verizon.net/res1ej4d/sitebuildercontent/sitebuilderpictures/frontyard2005.jpg&target=tlx_newAnd here's a link to the overview:http://mysite.verizon.net/res1ej4d/id15.htmlThe guy that taught me how to build ponds was quite skilled, and had great advice for "naturalizing" the look of a water feature. "Avoid the string of pearls," he said. If you run rocks all around the perimeter of your pond, it sticks out like a sore thumb. Gravel bars, half submerged driftwood and plant pockets (bogs) are all great devices to get around this effect. Unfortunately, they all compromise the water quality and fish safety, so you have to pick and choose with some care. -t
Ted,
That is a beautiful waterfeature you had! Is that a Japanese red maple in the background?
I have 25 tons of various sized limestone "washrock" a-stone, golfball to vollyball sized and about a dozen granite and limestone boulders that range from 30" to 72". I turned my Kubota over once! Fortunately, not in the water. I will have to hire someone to move the 72" 5 ton rock. About a third of the rock is placed. I found a prettey good source locally that charged $70/ton, delivered. We were forewarned about and are trying to avoid the "pearl necklace effect". We have a fairly steep shoreline below the coping shelf that will hopfully dissuade the herons from fishing there.
Submerged gravel bars will compromise the water quality? How so? I have a lot of work to do, and while the liner, skimmer, waterfall/filter box are inplace and plumbed up and operating, the remaining fininshing is yet to be done. Where the waterfall stream meets the main pond body, I was planning on a sumberged gravel bar accented with a few large subsurface rocks/boulders. Bad idea?
Hi Tim:Thanks for the compliment, you're quite kind. I can't remember the cultivar on the maple - possibly Tamukeyama? Out in the Pac NW, you can't swing a dead cat without hitting a dozen laceleaf maples. To my mind, the real beauty in that garden was the weeping Katsura. We noticed one at the Chinese Garden in Portland:http://www.portlandchinesegarden.org/plants/PlantDisplay.php?ID=424 Gravel bars shouldn't be a big problem, although they tend to collect silt from runoff. The wasps love them! We later planted ground covers above the gravel beds to work as a pre-filter. The koi people are big on having VERY CLEAN water, although most of the reasons tend to be somewhat nebulous. The claim is that you harbor more "bad" bacteria and interfere with nitrogen cycling. The latter is NOT my experience - in 3 years my overloaded 2000 gallon system never showed even low levels of ammonia - but I'm no expert. It's really the shallow areas that cause most problems - herons will sit motionless for hours and wait until a fish ambles by... Larger Koi are notorious for rooting up plants, so you might want to reconsider the $75 rare tropical water lillies!The only concern with big stones is adequately dispersing the load on the liner. For huge (>1000#) stones, you want a pad UNDER the liner along with padding (wrapping 2" polyfoam with textile fabric makes a good mattress) above the liner. The idea is that if the ground under the stone sinks, the liner will be stretched out around the perimeter of the stone. If you have hardpan or well draining and compacted soil, this settling wouldn't be as big a concern. If not, you might consider laying a small concrete pad under your 5 ton rock. Otherwise you'll have to pick it back up to fix the leak! One other thing: I'm told that limestone can cause some pH cycling problems early on. I'm out in granite/basalt country, so I don't have experience there. It's not a big deal, just something to check for every now and then.I would test the flow across the pond from the waterfall before placing any larger rocks in front of it, just to avoid any surface dead spots. It's pretty much trial and error work. Gravel will slow the water flow as well, even though it might be a foot below water level. You can also address dead spots by adding additional water jets to push surface water towards the skimmer. You just T off the line leading to your waterfall filter and run the hose where you want. Actually, Koi should grow faster when you have water jets, as it gives them an "exercise" area.I need a backhoe before I build my next pond. I like to think that I "earned" my bad back. While you can move astonishingly large (e.g 500#) rocks with a truck, come-along, PVC pipe rollers and wrecking bar - it comes at a price!While the gravel bog filter worked pretty well (the wild rice and cattails thrived in it!) they tend to clog over time. If I built another one, I'd structure it conically and include a clean out assembly so that I could pump high pressure water down through the bed and out to waste. Otherwise, you have to dig out the gravel every 2 - 5 years. I didn't know that at the time. For the time and labor, putting a bead filter seems like a reasonable investment. If you put a bead filter in ahead of a bog filter, you should be able to downsize both, and avoid having to clean the "natural" bog filter. Have fun! It's obviously an addictive hobby, and you end up a master plumber/landscaper/aquaculturist/ditchdigger for your efforts!-t
Well I asked once and I should
let it go but for some reason it's bugging me.
That is way to big for an ornamental pond. Why the liner?
In a few years you are going to have an actual ecosystem
going their, and your little pump question is going to be
settled by mother nature.
So honestly why not just go with a real pond? Not trying to bust your
balls, thinking you have a good reason.
honestly why not just go with a real pond?
I'm not Tim, but i have two guesses. Liner works both ways, keeps water in ans well as out. Having to import a quality clay, then compacting it to the sort of water-tight a pond requires can be expensive--more so in smaller proportions. So, a liner offers two neat advantages, speed and economy.
In my county, a stock tank is not too hard, but only if you have the right Cat handy and can keep scraping until you turn a good layer of clay. Not the sort of thing easily done in a back yard. You also learn (sometimes the hard way) that a tank needs to be in a natural watershed, so that it gets refilled. Chosing one that refills faster than seeping away & evaporation is the trick of that.
We have a city ampitheatre with a lawn for seating. City fathers decreed that a pond woulf be pretty, and directed the gouging out os a great basin which would be a pond, In reality, they decreased the fall of the watershed and put a giant decelerator on anything carried in the water--not so much a pond as a silt dump. They even dredged it four times (last two with the uh-oh of contaminates found in the dredgings--decellerate the water and everything falls out). Great teaching tool it was <g>.Occupational hazard of my occupation not being around (sorry Bubba)
Good points.
I guess those were in line with my thoughts. You make a
hole but it may not make a pond.
Many places you don't necessarily need to import clay, but
rather pack the natural clay on the sight.
The liner see,s to dictate that you need to add water from time
to time. After a certain size I would guess you better off
making a pond.
After a certain size I would guess you better off making a pond.
And you can get liners to swimming pool size and they make seaming tape if you need some other proportion.
Over closer to the river I've seen "other sourced" epdm going into stock tanks as the silt and sand content of the soil was just too high.
Emailed the aquaculturist I know, and the other issue of "natural" pond bottoms is that you can't plant anything on them, or the roots "break" the "liner" (unless you go to landfill "impermeable" high impaction clay). Or, you have to put a softer layer over a harder layer in the bottom, and without the right size sheep's foot roller, you get compaction issues. On liner size, she opined that you should not use a liner bigger than your mini-excavator can pull. And that you ought to seam joints if you do.Occupational hazard of my occupation not being around (sorry Bubba)
Thanks for the feed back guy's.
I think the part I was forgetting was, these
are ornamental ponds. thus they have to go where we want
them rather then where they want to be.
Hi Henley:It seems like it should work, but the reality is that virtually all "natural" ponds have some source of incoming water. If you just dig a hole in the ground, you'll get a mud puddle. I think the septic guys call it a perc. test! If money was no object, you could just pour tap water in day and night, but you'd be amazed at how quickly you lose water - both through evaporation into the air and wicking into the surrounding soil. My rubber-lined 2000 gallon pond could lose as much as 100-200 gallons on a single hot Seattle-area day (although I had a huge relative surface area because of the 40' X 1.5' stream). And without mechanical filtration and nitrogen cycling, you'd quickly end up with something more like a swamp or wetland. Fish need the oxygen that moving water provides.Actually, one of the biggest mistakes people make is putting their pond at the low point of the landscape. Once it rains, where does the extra water go? Oops! Having a downslope area to drain overflow keeps things under control. And as far as the size goes? Once you build a pond, you realize that it's never big enough... It's not just the fish, it's the waterlillies, lotus, taro, hyacinth, waterlettuce, cattails, wild rice, sedges, corkscrew rushes, etc...
I have created a berm and swale to divert rain runoff around the the pond, although the siting is not ideal in that respect, it is the only real option available on my property and one I hope I have accounted for properly.
I expected to and do have to add water on a regular basis. So far, I haven't had what I would consider hot or dry days, but a few hundred gallons a week has been my experience so far.
This is a big ornamental pond. The reason for the liner or at least my reasoning for the liner is that is it cleanable. Silt, algae, waste, debris, mulm, etc., can be hosed down to the bottom drain and removed when necessary. It it built as a large bowl with steep sides and a drain at the bottom. I looked into the clay option and decided against it. Time will tell if that was wise or not.
I have a friend that lined his 5 acre lake because the rock bottom he dug into leaked. Also is that a GRAVELY in the background. I own 3 walk behinds. 7.6 HP, 12 HP, and a 16HP.
Yes, that is my original workhorse, a 20 hp Gravely. With a 50" mower deck and 48 in snowthrower attachement, I have put about 1500 hours on in the 10 years I've owned it. I've had to replace the Kohler fuel pump and the shaft in the snowthrower and that's about it. I have 12-1/2 acres of heavily wooded acreage. I did have to get a loader tractor, a 43 hp Kubota, for the heavy work, but still love the Gravely.
A local flower shop had one in the store--brick and concrete pond (which I've heard is not good because mortar and concrete makes the water basic and not good for the fish) that used little water falls to supposedly aerate the water. Every time I went in the store, the koi were all gulping air at the surface. I begged them to get a real aeration system and even resaerched it and gave them names of places that sold them. Last time I went, the pond was gone. They said all the koi died and so no need for the pond. Great.
I have a very, very small indoor goldfish pond. My 18 month experience with this pond might give some insight.
At 35 gallons, with the water pan 36" OD by 10" deep, there isn't enough space for koi. Goldfish, like koi, are but glorified carp. One of my goldfish is easily big enough to make a respectable meal (body 7" long, probably weighs a pound).
Here is what I've learned ..... (so far) .....
The first matter of concern is water temperature. They seem to prefer water cooler than 75 degrees; 68-70 seems about right. In practice, this means the more water, and the deeper it is, the safer you are. Our local 30 degree day/night temperature swings -every day- plays havoc with my water temperature.
Deep water, even sheltered hollows, help provide pockets of water that have a more stable temperature.
Sunlight can raise the water temp very quickly. A pond needs daylight, but direct sun is generally a bad thing.
Sunlight brings up another issue: algae. There's a natural chemical 'cycle' in a pond: Fish food -> Fish -> Fish waste -> Plant food -> Plant. Now, those "plants" can be either real plants, or algae. If real plants consume the nutrients, there will be little algae.
This can also be helped along with snails, crabs, and catfish - all of whom help keep the pond clean. Many of these, however, are even more sensitive to temperature swings and excessive sunlight.
Real plants and koi do present a bit of a conflict; the fish will try to dig them up, and chew any exposed roots. You may need to protect the plants from the fish, especially the larger ones. You can corral the plants into areas where the fish can't get to them, protect the roots with plastic baskets, and screens are sold for this purpose.
My water is filtered / treated in a couple different ways.
First, a false bottom to the pond acts as an 'under gravel' filter. That is, water is drawn through the gravel, where the coarsest grit is trapped, and bacteria has it's first chance to work on the waste. (Bacteria is an essential part of the cycle I described).
Water is then drawn into a filter with both mesh and ceramic media. The mesh - in two sizes - traps small particles. The ceramic pieces are there to provide a good place for bacteria to do it's thing.
I do NOT, ordinarily, need to 'chemically filter' the water by passing it over charcoal or zeolite.
Water is then pumped past an UV light. This light is there to kill algae. It won't eliminate the problem, but it will help keep it small.
Finally, the water passes through a heater. You'd be surprised just how much power the heater can use!
The water is then sent to the top of a quiet waterfall, which aerates the water on it's way back to the pond.
Which brings us to another issue: evaporation. In the summer, I need to replace 10% of the water daily. That's water I need to chemically treat first, to remove chlorine.
A side effect of this evaporation is the gradual accumulation of salts and minerals in the water. Of primary concern are the phosphates- these are what feed the algae. You will need to allow for periodically pumping 'old' water out, and replacing it with 'new.' I suggest you add this function to your filter plumbing.
Koi are pretty tough, and can handle low oxygen levels and higher mineral contents than most fish. Koi do, however, create more of a mess for the filter to deal with than other fish.
There will come a time when the fish will become too big for the pond. You will have to replace them at that time.
WINTER: Talk to your local pond shop. If the pond is properly designed and equipped, it is possible for the fish to survive the winter. If nothing else, a year-round pond will make it much easier for the 'cycle' to get settled next Spring.
FISH TYPES: Koi often cost hundreds of dollars EACH. I would want the pond to prove itself, over a couple years, before spending that kind of money. The first few months, as that 'cycle' is getting stabilized, is a particularly difficult time for the fish. I'd stick with goldfish during this time; you can get some pretty large ones for $5.
HABITAT: My fish seem most active at the margins of the day; during mid-day, they seem to prefer to find shade and shelter. The smaller fish seem to seek out places that the larger fish can't easily reach.
I am considering an outdoor pond myself. My observations have me thinking along the lines of building some sort of deck, or platform, over much of the pond.
I had a small (100 gallon) plastic pond in a garden with a few inexpensive (like $4-5) petshop koi. The two largest are just over 1 year old and are 16" long. I bought a few more small inexpensive ones since I got the pond going. So now I have two that are about 16" two that are about 8-10", two that are 5-6" and three that are about 3" long. The little guys hide most of the time. I have some comets and shubunkins as well. I have noticed the fish are most active at dusk and dawn, as well.
What would be too big for my pond? I've heard that koi live for up to hundreds of years, but average something like 40 years and grow to 36" long. I haven't seen koi that big, but I'm looking forward to it! I have trouble with the concept of $100's or $1000's for individual fish, regardless of the pond being well seasoned. At my pond supplier, he has imported Japanese Koi that are far beyond my budget. But a 24" plus Koi is an impressive fish.
When I was looking into this project, I found some ine.xpensive books at the Associated Koi Clubs of America, on ponds, construction, filters and basic concepts, and one example showed a pond that was patially decked over with complete pergola coverage. I plan to have a deck partially cantilevered over the edge of the pond I have setup as the feeding area.
I am no expert but I do know you need to provide shelter in the form of overhanging rocks and tree branches.
Heard a story of a millionaire in Martha's Vineyard who had a large Koi pond built and stocked with $20K worth of fish. Large colorful fish against a black background in a shallow pond make for easy pickings for the local Osprey.
http://www.koiphen.com is one of the best sites on the web --- many experienced people post there regularly
Bob Chapman
Thanks Bob, that looks like an excellent site. I will be cheking this out. Are you a Koi keeper/pond owner, too?
Read dicussions on koi ponds with interest and thought you may be interested in my forty years experience of keeping kio and other fresh water fish.
I have made many mistakes in that time, but there's no substitute for experience and in the end, no matter what you read or what you are told, you either learn or your fish suffer and die.
So the first thing you must ask yourself is what type of pond do I want. Is it because your are interested in fish and what to keep and care for them or do you want fish to improve your garden and to impress your friends by the size of your pond and the fish that swim in it.
If your answer is the latter then delete this message for I can be of no help to you.
To answer a few of your guestions. I have built about fourteen ponds, five for myself the rest for others. My oldest fish is thirtynine years old he wieghs 21lb is twentysix inches long and is a black koi ghost. The largest fish in my pond (BIG DAVE) he is thirtysix years old and is massive twentysix lb, his length is thirtyfour inches, both these fish I bought when they were three to four inches long.
My present fish pond is a reasonably size pond for an Engish garden. It holds 6500 gallons and is five feet deep at its deepest point. The water is feed from two four inch oulets set at the bottom of the pond, the water is gravity feed into a two hundred gallon three sections brush filter sytems, this removes large debris and I clean only the front section regularly, the second and third has been left to mature for good bacterial growth.
The water is then gravity feed into the two thousand per hour pond pump, this I have set into another water tank to reduces pump noise From this tank the water is pumped throught a thirtysix inch U/V system and finally into a 600 hundred gallons final filter tank before overflowing through 6 two inch pipes into the water fall. The final filter tank is only cleaned if you experience filtration problems otherwise it is left alone. I have not cleaned mine for six years,
I have a seperate pump for the skimmer system which I used when necassary. I also run a constant powerful air pump which pumps air through seven large aireation blocks into the pond with a further five running diectly into the filtertanks.
There are 70 fish in the pond mainly large Kio, but goldfish, fantails, golden orf's, and tench of all different sizes swim happily amongst them.
I know you can be blunt by the comments you have made to others, so if you give it, then you should be able to take it, all of this research should have been done before you even started this project. however if you wish to contact me for further info feel free to do so.
Hope some of this helps you, Regards Gerry
Seventy fish in 6500 gallons! Some of them are three feet long! You've got to admit, that's "American Professional" level density... Most people would have serious difficulty keeping that many fish healthy in that size system. A Japanese koi keeper would stock less than 20 mature fish in a 6K gallon system.Still, keeping individual Koi alive for almost 4 decades is a powerful testament to your care. Nice work.
It's true the larger fish grew to this size when my fish stocks where far less, it's also true that most British proffesional Kio keepers would agree with your comments regarding fish stocks to water ratio's but I don't consider myself to be a proffessional kio keeper and that the difference.
I don't fuss about with my pond water, I don't fill my pond with every chemical know to man, I don't buy expensive large fish, I buy good quality one to two year old kio and let nature take it's course. I have not bought any fish in the last seven years and quess what, my smaller fish are still growing to very respectable sizes. Plus in all those years I have lost only a hand full of fish to disease.
Thanks for the complement, as you say, I must be doing something right. I assure you ( old dave) agree's with you
Gerry,
First, I appreciate your comments and hope to benifit from your experience. I welcome any deserved criticism.
The pond was concieved and is being built for the fish. I hope to keep the stocking levels light, but we will see. At present, the basic filtration system is all that is in place. I expect to upgrade/modify and/or append this sytem as time, experience and necessity dictates. Quite possibly an error that will create future work, but a reality nonetheless.
The system consists of a two section skimmer with a large debris basket, filter brushes and a pump chamber. The pump is a 16000 gph unit that discharges through a 3" pipe that feeds into the bottom of the main filter box with three filter pads and (6) 2-1/2 cu.ft media bags. The top outlet of the filter box gravity feed the falls and riffles and back to the main pond body.