Hi all, Bought a house last fall with a pond, didn’t really do much all winter or even spring other than try to keep it clean. Finally now getting time to dig in and maintain it, etc. (Cross-country move, with kids, so “life” got in the way till now.)
I’ll summarize: it stayed surprisingly clean all winter, that is water fairly clear (have one huge c. 2 ft. koi, who is 18 yrs old per previous owner). No algae to speak of, etc. although I have not yet got a good test kit. (Old stuff left with the house, fairly sure the reagents are all expired.)
Couple weeks ago, decided to do (first) water chance, and clean equipment. Imagine my surprise to find out that the pump to the filter was not plugged in at all (since at least last Sept.). So...no water was going thru filter. Other pump, always on, only runs waterfall. Also the UV light and housing where it screws in is broken, so I’ll eventually need a new filter. But put it back together, sans UV. So I now at least have some filtration (that pump was all mucked up too, so it’s clean now and works).
So for a few days after, all was good, until I decided I needed to “re-seat” or replant one of my lily plants, as the root mass had come out of its pot and was floating. Here’s where I really screwed up: in my infinite wisdom, I put a shovel full of dirt from the garden in the pot to help hold the root mass down.
Ever since then, my once clear water has now been tinted brown. I took the pot out, used barley clarifier, a LOT, and after several days it’s only slightly better. And way worse than before I even started to do anything to the pond, including plug in the filter pump.
So as you can see, complete newbie screwup. Ideas? Thanks in advance!