Your duck pools - Tell me about them!

[KikiDeAnime]

Now that I have an actual job, I can start saving up enough to buy supplies to build my own duck pool for our ducks.
Tell me about your duck pool and what you used to build them, filters you added, etc..

If you have any photos of them, please share them! I love looking at photos of duck pools.

 

[Suprasoup]

I have an integrated setup where the duck pen, duck pond, koi pond are connected. All are pond lined. Total volume of the whole setup is ~2000g. Water from each flows to a below grade sump and an external 3000gph pumps water back to each separately via a spaghettis nest of valves and pvc pipe. The sump houses a 2’x 2’ x 3” coarse and fine filter media for mechanical filtration. Biological filtration is handled by the Duck ponds vegetable filter and the Koi ponds vegetable stream.

Duck pen with a self replenishing water bucket. Excess flows back to sump. Pen is flooded daily to export duck poop.


Duck pond is ~250-300g. Pond Filter is pea gravel and plants. Water is forced up the pea gravel via a series of perforated pvc pipes.


Koi pond. ~1200g. Water from the koi pond passes through the stream and flows to the duck pond. The stream has become a jungle of water parsley which the ducks love to eat. Fortunately it grows so fast it’s almost impossible for them to devour it all.


The sump also contains a settling chamber for the ducks pen and duck pond. 90% of the duck poo ends up here for export into the garden. ~250-300g

 

[MrsTush]

I have an integrated setup where the duck pen, duck pond, koi pond are connected. All are pond lined. Total volume of the whole setup is ~2000g. Water from each flows to a below grade sump and an external 3000gph pumps water back to each separately via a spaghettis nest of valves and pvc pipe. The sump houses a 2’x 2’ x 3” coarse and fine filter media for mechanical filtration. Biological filtration is handled by the Duck ponds vegetable filter and the Koi ponds vegetable stream.

Duck pen with a self replenishing water bucket. Excess flows back to sump. Pen is flooded daily to export duck poop.
View attachment 2732496

Duck pond is ~250-300g. Pond Filter is pea gravel and plants. Water is forced up the pea gravel via a series of perforated pvc pipes.
View attachment 2732494

Koi pond. ~1200g. Water from the koi pond passes through the stream and flows to the duck pond. The stream has become a jungle of water parsley which the ducks love to eat. Fortunately it grows so fast it’s almost impossible for them to devour it all.
View attachment 2732495

The sump also contains a settling chamber for the ducks pen and duck pond. 90% of the duck poo ends up here for export into the garden. ~250-300g
View attachment 2732497

Can I hire you??

 

[knwisdom]

I have 2 a 150 gal stock tank inside the coop and a 1200 gal outdoor pond that we dug in and lined with pond liner. Both have filters. each pond has a bio-steps Matala filter with UV clarifier and an additional biological filter, one in a barrel and one in a stock tank with bog plants.

the Matala Bio-steps is the black box. It is very easy to clean and the media lasts for years. I also use Microb lift bacteria to break down the duck waste. Both ponds are crystal clear. The water looks dark here just because of the algae on the sides of the stock tank.

 

[MrsTush]

I got these on Amazon. The smaller one was $35 and the bigger one was about $50..i think. They have a plug you can remove to drain which is really helpful. I'm in North Carolina so or humidity is always high. I drain them, house them out and refill every other day or they get green. The ducks love these and are always in them out using them for giant drinking dishes lol

 

[Suprasoup]

You don't happen to have a schematic of your filtration systems?
Is pump downflow of all filtration media?
Do you have bottom drains in ponds?

Unfortunately I tossed the drawings a few months back. Regardless I deviated a bit from the design when I started the build.

The external pumps inlet is downflow of both the coarse/fine mechanical filter pads as well as the settling chamber.
Both the Koi pond and the Duck pond are above ground with a portion below ground as well.

The Koi pond has a 3” bottom drain (which goes directly to filter pads) and the streams inlet acts as the Koi ponds surface skimmer. The streams outlet (1” bottom drain) flows to the Duck pond.

The Duck Pond has a 1.5” bottom drain as well as a 1.5” surface skimmer. Bottom drain flows to the settling chamber and the surface skimmer flows to the filter pads.

Duck pen has a 1.25” bottom drain that flows to the settling chamber.

The sump is 2.5-3’ below grade and is where all the drain pipes, pump inlet and filters are located.

Heres the bottom drain pipe being test fitted. Because the ponds are above ground the height of the pipes become important.


I’m sure I’m not describing it well. If you got anymore questions let me know.

 

[aart]

Unfortunately I tossed the drawings a few months back.

I’m sure I’m not describing it well.

You did fine, I get the terminology.
Most important are the bottom drains, settling tanks, and the pump being 'last in line'.

 

[Duckiiess]

I rented an excavator and dug a small pond at my place last fall. High water table here, so it filled naturally, no liner. Might be installing a liner this fall though, as erosion has been killer so far.. but if more growth takes to the banks that should control it too.. it's just a wait and see thing at this point.

 

[TwistedTayy]

Lol excuse the mess but we’re still setting things up. We have 3 of the $10 small hard plastic kiddie pools from TSC that are easy to flip and the gang can get in/out without trouble. We move those around sometimes depending on how soggy the ground is and to try not to kill the grass underneath. We have one in a small pen that we are using to introduce ducklings to the outdoors for now. They are so small that they need to be dumped a couple times a day, either because they get dirty or because the water warms up and the ducks just don’t use it. The larger pool is too large to move but it doesn’t get nearly as dirty (or used as much) it has a mosquito dunk in it and we let out about 80% of the water once a week.

 

[CluckerFamily]

I use a 59” kiddie pool. I siphon the pool with a pond pump and refill when needed (at least twice a week).