small yard pond

[thomassio]

Ok, I have a question. Its about duck ponds. I live in a suburban home. My garden is not big enough for a huge pond so I currently use a kiddy pool and dump it. It works fine but I would like something more natural and nice to look at. Im happy to spend time and effort making something and investing money in a pump etc. My question is 'is it possible? ' I have 6 runners so theres a fair bit of mess. Could a natural bog filter combined with a pump and filter designed for a much bigger pond ever work? I have read the duckponics thread and its brilliant but im still not clear on the answer!

Thanks everyone for reading

Thom.

 

[LaurelC]

It sounds like it's possible, but you'll have to invest some time/energy in maintaining it. I'm sure as heck going to try with mine, however only time will tell if I can make filtration a viable option.

Worst case scenario is you could get an attractive pond setup going, then every few days use a sump pump to drain some of the goo from the bottom out before refilling.

 

[TLWR]

This is the pond I built my original 3 ducks.
It now is used by 5 ducks, 2 dogs as a drinking bowl and 3 chickens as a drinking bowl.
https://www.backyardchickens.com/t/496237/building-a-pond-step-by-step-mostly-complete-post71


I drain it a couple times a year, clean, drain and clean the filter box and then refill.
If I were to do it again, I'd go with the original plan of putting a drain in the filter box as well.
The water is disgusting, but nobody cares. I do skim it for leaves and poop, but still vile. I'd freak out if I fell into it LOL

But, when I just used a large kiddie pool (with slide), the ducks would avoid it after 3 days because it was gross. The filter and moving water of their current pond makes a difference to them. It doesn't smell, so I'm good. The less I have to dump and refill 1000 gallons, the better for my water bill!

 

[thomassio]

Wow, that's exactly what I was looking for! Great, comprehensive thread and all steps included. Thank you. I think I will try something similar but I might try and also filter the water through a live bog type filter with plants as well. Obviously that area will be seperate and fenced off from the girls! If and when I do, I will be sure to add a thread on here. I'm always open to more suggestions and ideas though so keep them coming!

 

[TLWR]

the girls ate the filtering live plants. And what they didn't, the dogs did LOL

 

[thomassio]

Haha! There is a series of videos on YouTube by someone called ponddigger, I think they are titled 'patio pond with live bog filter' or something very similar. Really good videos, and whilst not enough to clean a duck pond alone, I'm hoping with a decent filter, a larger scale and allowing the ducks limited access, maybe it can work. Maybe!