Plans for a Duck Pond

[OldGuy43]

Here's my current idea:



The pond itself is an old used bathtub. The filter is a 5 gallon bucket with small holes in the bottom and several layers of burlap as a filter agent. The pump is a fountain pump from Harbor Freight. I've used a similar one before in a turtle pond. The tube at the bottom, shown here in white is a piece of PVC pipe with lots of tiny holes in it and wrapped with a kind of plastic coarse weave cloth that I found alongside the road.

Thoughts, suggestions?

 

[Kevin565]

How will the fresh water be returned to the pond? I see where your siphoning it out but where is the return flow?

 

[OldGuy43]

Through the small holes in the bottom of the 5 gallon bucket.

How will the fresh water be returned to the pond? I see where your siphoning it out but where is the return flow?

 

[Kevin565]

How often do will you be cleaning the filter agent?

 

[destinduck]

I dont want to sound like a butt. But I have never seen a filtering system work for ducks because of their habits. About all you can do is minimise the dirt going into it.(thru gravel or sand around the water source) They will always poop so much and put in such a bioload. That the best thing you can do is water changes if you want it healthy and/ clear. I will say an easy way to change the water is with a sump pump with a hose attached that way you can recycle it away from your pens or water plants.

 

[OldGuy43]

I dont want to sound like a butt. But I have never seen a filtering system work for ducks because of their habits. About all you can do is minimise the dirt going into it.(thru gravel or sand around the water source) They will always poop so much and put in such a bioload. That the best thing you can do is water changes if you want it healthy and/ clear. I will say an easy way to change the water is with a sump pump with a hose attached that way you can recycle it away from your pens or water plants.

You needn't worry about that! When I ask a question I want ideas and opinions, not validation. I'm old enough to know what I don't know. I want to learn.

Yeah, I know that filter won't do much for the biodirt. It's there mostly to help with mosquito control (They're really bad here about!) and to circulate the water. My plan calls for draining as often as necessary and than vacuuming the pond out with my wet vac. That's why the drain pipe is under the tub.

Keep those cards and letters comin' friends.

 

[Kevin565]

You could also add aquatic plants to the filter. They help absorb some of the nutrients.

 

[OldGuy43]

How often do will you be cleaning the filter agent?

When the water flow slows. I got the idea from a live shrimp bait tank that we had at a shrimp stand many years ago when I was living on Galveston Bay.

New idea:
I'm considering adding a product called Mosquito Dunks to the output side of the filter. Called the people who make them and they seem genuinely interested in the idea. Asked that I call them back with the results. You can read about Mosquito Dunks here:

http://www.summitchemical.com/mosquito/mosquito-dunks/

I've been using them in the stock tank with great results for several years.

 

[70%cocoa]

OldGuy, what is the white underground tube for?

I might suggest putting the bathtub entirely above ground with the drain leading to somewhere that can handle a sudden influx of dirty water. Otherwise draining it will be quite a pain.

Your idea of filtering the water though something to extend its life a bit sounds fine to me. You might find that burlap gets clogged up too quickly so just experiment with the fineness of your filter medium.

I filter my water using a grey-water rated filter but I only filter it so it can go through a dripper system onto my veggie garden. The water is still quite gross once it comes out the other side of the filter. My water is changed every day, so it only has 24 hours in the pond but that is well and truly long enough for it to get pretty manky (if you have ducks that love swimming).

With your set up I'd do it so that you can change your plan if you find that Plan A doesn't work as you expect. You might find that you will just need to deal with the dirty water by draining, hosing out and then re-filling, and not worrying about filtering. So don't set it up just yet in a way that'd prevent you from going back to a more basic system if you decide to. i.e. don't dig it into the ground just yet. At least trial the system above ground, unless the white below ground pipe is integral to the whole thing in some way.

 

[rainplace]

How many ducks? That has a lot to do with how well it will work.