Fell into the Aquascape trap renovating our pond. Really could use y'alls help here

[evastonian]

Hey everyone, just registered here and hoping to learn a lot, I'll give you some history first:

Moved into this house 1.5 years ago and it had this Koi pond and it was NOT happy. Water completely green, just a little mesh filter, way over stocked (7 Koi, 6 goldfish @ less than 1000 gallons). Sad. Worked with a local supply company and got a submersible pump to pressure filter with UV and a waterfall. It was a fix and it did pretty darn good as a "good enough" solution.

Last week we decided to pull the trigger on getting it renovated. This is the before. I typically over-research and over prepare but this was something I thought I could trust the contractor with, he's a cool guy, said he's independent but works with Aquascape, cool, makes no difference to me, I just want more room for the fish and to get rid of the shelves.

Well he finished Friday. As we went along it seemed fine. The shelves LOOKED smaller, LOOKED bigger, but once the water, rocks, and fish were in.... the pond looks the same. Same shelves, same (maybe less?) depth @ 2'. It's just a far cry from what we wanted and we're a ton of money in the hole. I was completely unaware of their reputation. I know now, and just want to move forward on how to make this work until we find a fix, and what that fix should look like. I'm talking with the contractor on what we can do to make this right.

This is the birds eye view

I got some amazing help on reddit and am actively talking with a member there, and going to my local Koi club's next meeting.

So, here I am, looking to the future and trying to avoid another miss-step.

THE NOW: he put in a 3k GPH pump/skimmer/waterfall system. Moves a lot of water so it'll do some heavy lifting. What can I do NOW to make the system work better. Plants? Put back in my 2.7k GPH submersible/pressure filter? We'll be putting up a net tomorrow.

THE FUTURE: I've been informed about bottom drains, and bead filters. Ideally we dig this out and get rid of the shelves and go 4' down and get rid of interior rocks. That should get us to where we need to be, keeping the skimmer and waterfall.

When it comes to bottom drain and filter, we are pretty tight on space but I could go under the fence and back to the waterfall. Probably. Could I do a bottom drain to an above ground filter? How?

I'm interested in any thoughts you might have, and recommendations on fixing this without spending the same money all over again. Just trusted the process and got screwed. Thanks for reading everyone!

[aquaholic]

How set are you on keeping KOI?
It's a fairly small water volume and would make a lovely goldfish pond with existing filtration. Just checking before you start changing things again.

[evastonian]

You ask a good question. At the very least we want to keep THESE Koi. They've been here for so long and we want(ed) to help them live their best life moving forward. We had one die yesterday (was already sick probably but the change put him over the edge). And we're worried moving forward that we made it WORSE for them wtih the rocks and just a skimmer now instead of a UV pressure filter.

I think we've just been enamored with the Koi and have just had it in our heads to make it better for them. Even if we moved to a goldfish pond, I could see us going back to Koi one day. But we love these Koi so the idea of getting rid of them is pretty sad.

[aquaholic]

The KOI club will help but the biggest issue is pond volume with the number of fish you have.
Going down deeper for more volume if you can't go larger area, going up with raised walls, having more flow through to waste (changing water more frequently) are all methods to do that.

[KoiFan84]

If that’s the max surface area you can get you need to go deep. Deep is good for koi. I would do 5.5ft instead of 4. Vertical walls and no rocks at all. A bottom drain to an external pump with built in leaf basket to a bead filter with an air blower to help with backwashing to a uv unit back into the pond is ideal. Bead filters are quite expensive though. If it’s too much I would get the biggest regular pressure filter you can find to run the external pump into. Make sure it’s well built, because you will need to backwash it a couple times a week. If putting a regular BD is not feasible look into a retro bottom drain that sits on top of the liner

[Orlando]

Aquascape, I think at this point the most economical thing you could do would be to remove all the rocks from the bottom and purchase a pressurized self contained filter they come with their own pump and pre-filter and just add it to the existing set up, hope this helps ��

[evastonian]

The KOI club will help but the biggest issue is pond volume with the number of fish you have.
Going down deeper for more volume if you can't go larger area, going up with raised walls, having more flow through to waste (changing water more frequently) are all methods to do that.

I believe we can get rid of the shelves in there and go deeper all around. I'm almost positive. Just some tree roots. Would easily end up at 2k gallons if we went 4' (would be roughly 8x12x4)

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[evastonian]

If that’s the max surface area you can get you need to go deep. Deep is good for koi. I would do 5.5ft instead of 4. Vertical walls and no rocks at all. A bottom drain to an external pump with built in leaf basket to a bead filter with an air blower to help with backwashing to a uv unit back into the pond is ideal. Bead filters are quite expensive though. If it’s too much I would get the biggest regular pressure filter you can find to run the external pump into. Make sure it’s well built, because you will need to backwash it a couple times a week. If putting a regular BD is not feasible look into a retro bottom drain that sits on top of the liner

Thanks! So he put in a skimmer but took out what I had before which is a 2.7kgph solid handling pump to an external pressure filter with UV. I might throw it back in until we can get it resolved but I'm worried about too much water cycling (3kgph pump in the skimmer). Is that okay for such a small pond right now?

My plan is to probably: dig the pond back out and put in plain liner, put back in my filter system in the meantime, move to a retro bottom drain that's pump fed to an external filter. Any recommendations on achieving that?

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[evastonian]

Aquascape, I think at this point the most economical thing you could do would be to remove all the rocks from the bottom and purchase a pressurized self contained filter they come with their own pump and pre-filter and just add it to the existing set up, hope this helps ��

Thank you! Yeah I actually already have that system as it's what I was using before. So I might throw it in, I'm just worried about cycling too much water, it's roghly 1k gallons and I'd have almost 6k of filtering between the skimmer and the pump I have for the pressure filter.

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[Orlando]

Thank you! Yeah I actually already have that system as it's what I was using before. So I might throw it in, I'm just worried about cycling too much water, it's roghly 1k gallons and I'd have almost 6k of filtering between the skimmer and the pump I have for the pressure filter.

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There's no such thing as too much filtration too much current is another thing...

[evastonian]

There's no such thing as too much filtration too much current is another thing...

Yeah my worry is just that the skimmer plus the submersible pump will be moving too much water

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[evastonian]

How set are you on keeping KOI?
It's a fairly small water volume and would make a lovely goldfish pond with existing filtration. Just checking before you start changing things again.

Hey aquaholic! Wanted to revisit this idea. Let's say we get rid of the Koi (or most of them) and move to goldfish. Is it still okay to have shelves and the like with goldfish? Or does that still pose an issue? It would allow us to load it up with plants, but a skimmer is enough filtration for goldfish?

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[coolwon]

You can close a discharge valve on a pond water pump system to reduce the water amount and velocity to match the suggested turn over rate

required for the ponds filtration system.

A closed suction valve creates cavitation.

Not a good thing on water pumps.

Lower water amount, equals less water, lower electric motor amperage.

Could be a big saving in electricity, depending how oversized the pump is.

Shelves make it easier for aquatic birds to capture your fish.

The birds long legs in shallow water make it easier to stretch further into the pond area and catch fish.

[aquaholic]

Hey aquaholic! Wanted to revisit this idea. Let's say we get rid of the Koi (or most of them) and move to goldfish. Is it still okay to have shelves and the like with goldfish? Or does that still pose an issue? It would allow us to load it up with plants, but a skimmer is enough filtration for goldfish?

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Goldfish have a much smaller biomass (less biological filtration demand) and don't stir up the bottom sediment as much as KOI (simpler mechanical filtration with less maintenance) so yes, you could keep your pond as it is.

But if you have sentimental attachment to your KOI then build a bigger better pond (or two).

[65efi5.0]

If it were me I would remove the rock and add you depth above ground as well as removing the shelves. This added height will also allow you to hide any filtration behind the wall and or waterfall and bring the koi a little higher for easier viewing. This would be a more formal look rather than a natural look but might fit your wants a little better. Maybe live with what you have for a bit while planning for the next upgrade. Removing the rocks now is more fun than waiting for the muck to build up. You probably have 1-2 years before the clean out will really smell. Good luck!