Ric and Gator :

We have one stand/drain pipe like Ric described with valve at bottom. Valve is to hard to open. Wish the valve was at outlet as Ric describes. We put a siphon that goes down into pond with a u joint over the edege of stand pipe and down into stand pipe with valve at bottom of siphon inside stand pipe. It has a short piece of pipe that stands up at top of u joint with a cap. That is where you fill up with water then just pull the long handle attached to valve and it works like a charm. It is a 6 in. pvc pipe and takes about 15 gals of water to start. So one advantage of a stand pipe is you can add a siphon to it if you want and you don't have to go over or through dam again. Ric we got the balloon valve at a plumbing/water supply store -- no big deal to them they were suprised we didn't know about them. ewest