Pond Boss Forums INTRO Questions & Observations New well with pics!

As many pondbossers know the pond is an ever demanding quest for perfection! We installed an aeration unit that has surpassed anything I could have hoped for. Our water quality has improved so much and the health of our fish and ecosystem after the aeration is just hard to believe. The algae issues we attacked from two directions. First we reduced the nutrient loading by planting buffers in and around our water shed and I control what the farmer puts on my fields and when. Now we are in a major drought! Our pond is as low as I have ever seen it! We are down 12 feet and I have an excessive amount of fish in a small area. I have been keeping close eye of the fish and the water quality and have cut feeding in half! WELL��� THE FARM 3 MILES AWAY just drilled a major well for irrigation and with in 5 days of coming on line he drew our water down two feet! Enough is enough! If you can�t beat them join them! We are building a new home and I needed a new well anyways���so I talked the wife into a 28gpm variable speed pump on a 6 in case drilled to 110foot. With this set up I can get 28gmp at the pond open flow and still have 13gpm to the new house. With the pond cut off I can supply the house and more irrigation zones than we need. After the well was drilled I ran 600 foot of 1.25 poly to the pond and started pumping for 4 hours at a time. My concern is the lack of oxygen in the well water and the fact that the well water temp is 51dg F. The PH on the well water is 6.72 and the ferries iron is 5ppm with no nitrates. I have been pumping from from 11am to 4pm for 3 days and have added a lot of water and thus far all is well with the fish and they are eating like pigs! Here are a few pics of the well and the pond. [url= http://"http://www.hunt101.com/?p=511406&c=500&z=1"] [/url][url= http://"http://www.hunt101.com/?p=511408&c=500&z=1"] [/url]

This after just 8 hours of pumping.[url= http://"http://www.hunt101.com/?p=511410&c=500&z=1"] [/url]

This was day 1 after 4 hours[url= http://"http://www.hunt101.com/?p=511412&c=500&z=1"] [url= http://"http://www.hunt101.com/?p=511413&c=500&z=1"] [/url][/url]

Ps fished last night for the first time in months. Caught a few huge BG and 1 CC at just under 8 pounds! Pics to follow. The HBSB are shy (except at feeding time)but growing like crazy!

Sounds like a great plan that came together as planned...even tho it may have been cobbled on the fly. 110 feet ain't all that far to get the lemons that you need for your lemonade.
Nice job, Salty.

Brettski we have good water at 30 foot but the 110 put me into a clean nitrait free water supply.

Nice job Salt. If you can stack up some cinder blocks in the pond so the well water hits them as the water goes in the pond it will add O2 and warm it a bit.

i put a foamer head on my well pipe so it will go in a little better than zero on the air.that is the foamer on the end of the pipe.

Thanks for the replies I still have my fingers crossed with the introduction of large quantities of well water. I am still running 4 hours a day and seem to be staying way ahead of the loss rate. I am gaining about 4 to 6 inches every 8 hours of run time. What kind of foam head is that Letrodeo�� something like a fire hose end? My long term goal is to build a mound on the shallow end of the pond and cover in chicken wire and rebar, then pour concrete and add rocks to shape a waterfall/spill way and then connect the pump to a float switch or a timer. That way it will add another aspect to our pond. I also like the horizontal aeration nozzles. But as of yet I have no idea how bad this pump is going to be on the electric bill��.time will tell! Plain B is to make use of our old 2 in well perhaps with air injection to a gravity trough or a high flow irrigation pump.Right now I just happy to have some water back in the pond!

Letsrodeo what size pump are you running,how far,and what is your GPM your water quality looks fantastic!

this runs off a small transfer pump about 1/4 hp pullin water from nere bottum, the other pipe in the other pic i us to keep the pond filled durin the hot summer months i do have a leek i need to fix at some piont it comes from the farms well 4" very deep i do us crystle plex for algae control i beleave this is where the color comes from along with an all clay bottum.