| Have you ever dreamt of a cool green garden with the tinkling of a fountain or a little stream bubbling by as you enjoy your nap? Many gardeners relish having a koi pond as the centre piece of their garden. But even though we all want a beautiful water feature in our garden, those water features must be constructed and maintained with thought and research and with the right pond supplies.
To keep your koi pond and water feature well-maintained in your outdoor garden area, there are few water gardening tips you need to know.
One of the most common concerns among water garden enthusiasts is keeping their pond water clean and clear. While many things contribute to good water clarity, below are a few helpful tips.
1. When shopping for your list of pond supplies, be sure to purchase a large enough filter. Many people skimp on this area or don’t know how to calculate the size of filter they may need and get too small of a filter. When in doubt, always get a larger filter than what you may think. Getting the right size of filter is the heart of keeping your pond water clean and clear. Ideally, your pond filter should filter the total volume of water in your pond or water garden every 2 – 4 hours, depending on how many fish you have.
2. Also within your list of pond supplies, get a good beneficial bacteria product such as Microbe Lift for small ponds or PlanktoniX for large ponds and lakes. Add your pond bacteria on a regular basis as the bacteria is responsible for decomposing organic matter in your pond such as sludge, silt, fallen leaves, etc. which provides food for green water algae to grow (among other things like string algae, pond weeds, etc).
3. Lastly, within your list of water garden or pond supplies, you may consider a UV clarifier or UV sterilizer. Using either of these products for your koi pond or water garden will help keep your pond crystal clear as microscopic pond algae (which makes your water look green) and bacteria, fungus and parasites can all be killed as the pond water passes through the ultra-violet light. Installing the UV clarifier or UV sterilizer within the plumbing system of your pond should ideally be after a pre-filter and before your mechanical and biological filter (often times sold as ‘all-in-one’ units). That way, the dead algae that the UV kills will get filtered into your pond filter and not get dispersed back into your pond.
With the right pond supplies and following a few helpful tips, building a pond or water garden can be very easy. There are informative online courses that will educate you on what you need to know in building a pond including information regarding what size of pond liner to use, how to determine the size of pond pump you need, determining what size of pond filter to have, how to construct the pond to suit a variety of water garden plants and so much more. Check out PondSolutions.com as they have a lot of water gardening tips and advice for koi ponds, fish ponds, water gardens of any size, and lakes.
Find more information relating to pond supplies, and water garden supplies here. |
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