BUILDING A PROPER KOI POND 2008 STYLE

Transcription

1 BUILDING A PROPER KOI POND 2008 STYLE First of all I will state, quite openly, that this is definitely not both a simple or an easy task to carry out and the amount of physical labour involved is very significant. Yet many enthusiasts attempt to build new Koi ponds with every passing year. Before one starts to even think about building a proper Koi pond system, one has first to decide on the final overall volume of water the system will eventually hold. The most important aspect of this is to calculate all the final running costs of the system which have to be met each day by the owner of the pond. These costs should be very carefully considered, such as:- Running costs of all electrical equipment employed. Water pumps to operate filters and surface skimmers; Air pumps to supply vital aeration to the filters and the bottom drains; U/V running costs; mains water charges and other costs such as the correct level of heating to the system, which is absolutely vital. After all of this, the actual costs of labour; building materials; equipment required; waste removal and any final landscaping materials required especially if you opt for a pergola or a waterfall. These significant costs should then be transferred to a computer and all added together before you finally decide the total water volume and overall expense of your planned system. After you have considered all these expenses we must now consider the style of the system we require. Do we want it completely in-ground or do we want part of the pond walls above-ground? Do remember, that the very best way of filtering a Koi pond today, by far, is by the GRAVITY PRINCIPLE, whereby water levels in both pond and filter must be equal. In short, if you wish to have your pond partially above ground then the filters must also be at that same level. By far, the single most expensive part of the entire overall installation is (depending on how much land you have available) the excavation work and the removal of soil. If you have enough land to remove the excavated soil to and if your property can allow enough room for an excavator to be used then the excavation costs will be totally decimated. However, I have seen situations where the excavation has to be carried out manually by spade and pick-axe and loaded onto wheelbarrows and then taken into the back door of the house and then through the front door of the house and then be loaded into the waste skip for removal! The entire operation costs a small fortune. On my own pond finished around 8 years ago, I was fortunate enough to be able to get a mini-digger into my back garden but the nearest I could get the waste skips to was my front drive. In view of this, the mini-digger loaded the wheelbarrows with excavated soil and these had to be pushed to the skip around the side of the house and emptied into the skip.

2 In total we used 120 skips for a pond and filter housing which contains some 16,500 gallons (75 tons) of water and space in the filter house to carry out daily servicing. The total costs of the skips came to 15, alone! This did not include the excavation or labour costs to carry out all the work involved in the overall project. If I had the luxury of taking the excavated soil to another part of my land plus the access which would allow a large excavator onto my land then the entire work would have cost me less than 2,000.00! To continue this article, let s say we will plan to build a 6,500 gallon system 30 tons or thereabouts. If we build this system to the perfect shape which is totally circular it will be around 14 feet in diameter and 7.0 feet deep at the very centre. By using this perfectly circular shape we can employ only one diffuser bottom drain with two 4 outlets installed at the exact center of the pond where the pond walls slope from 6 feet deep of water to 7.0 feet deep directly to the diffuser bottom drain. The two 4 outlets from this bottom drain would feed two separate banks of filters inside the filter house. If the pond instead is decided to be oval in shape then we would have to employ two diffuser bottom drains instead of one. However, the totally circular system would work far more efficiently than the oval one as far as flow-patterns and waste removal are concerned. The 4 diffuser bottom drain with two 4 outlets has been specifically fabricated to take only genuine UPVC pressure pipe and NOT household drainage pipe or similar. When you have to connect this tube to your filter systems always use swept, long radius, bends rather than a 90 degree elbows this will allow a greater flow-rate of water through the pipelines with far less friction restrictions. On this PROPER Koi pond, I would specify the following, assuming that this is a totally in-ground pond:- 1. As the pond will be 7.0 feet deep in the centre the entire excavation needs to be 8.0 feet deep by 15.5 feet in diameter to allow for the thickness of the walls. 2. A 6 deep concrete base will be poured into the base of the excavation and allow it to cure properly over 28 days. 3. The pond construction will be made by concrete common bricks which are approximately 9 long by 4 wide and 3 deep. The bricks will be laid on end to form a 9 thick wall and also provide to give us a perfectly circular pond. 4. After this, the bottom drain will be sited and the pipelines directed to the filter house.

3 5. After a few further courses of concrete common bricks have been laid we can pour in the second 6 deep pond base which will encase the 4 pipework and reach the top of the bottom drain. This is left to cure for a further 28 days. 6. Next, the pond walls are built in full and include small spaces for return 2 pipelines from the two filter pumps and one from the skimmer/heater line. If the budgeted money allows, this should be spent on reverse-flow returns which can alter the return the flow after each passing month. 7. After the concrete has fully cured we render the entire pond with ½ scratch coat and a final ¼ trowel finish. 8. Once this has cured the pond is professionally laminated by an expert in glass-fibre. 9. FILTERS! No doubt, the very best way to filter this pond is by way of purchasing two Nexus 200 filters from Evolution Aqua and link each of them up to the two outlets from your central diffuser bottom drain. 10. However, if you are confident enough for me to recommend another way to filter your water, just as well, but it does involve building, rendering and fibreglassing but will last and operate safely for many years to come I can do that also but I do not know if it will save you much money as the filters all have to be produced by hand and take up much more room than a Nexus but nowhere near as much depth so excavation and waste removal costs have to be taken into account at this time. 11. On top of all this you will need:- a. A surface skimmer, usually about b. Three external water pumps which are capable of each actually pumping 1,700 gallons per hour back to the pond together with the lowest amount of electricity possible. c. Three 40lpm air pumps one to supply air to each of the two banks of filters and another to supply aeration to the bottom diffuser drain. d. Two TMC U/V 55 watt units to be connected to each of the 2 filter return lines. e. An 80,000 btu gas heater and thermostat powered by the skimmer system. f. All the water test kits imaginable. g. A good microscope and the knowledge of how to use it. h. Miles upon miles of UPVC pipework and many 2 double union ball valves never use slide valves! i. An in-line thermometer to monitor the entire system. j. Very good quality Koi food. k. Very good Koi nets and a few bowls. l. Pond cappings to make the surface of your pond much more attractive.

4 12. As if this has not already cost us enough we still have to find Nishikigoi to put in our brand new Koi pond and take great care of them on a daily basis. With a Koi pond of this cost it is useless to stock it with low-grade Koi from garden centres or general-grade tateshita from low-grade Koi outlets. Please take great care when you are selecting your Nishikigoi and seek advice from more experienced enthusiasts. 13. The main problem I have at the minute is actually recommending a good and very useful Nishikigoi book to our customers that has not been already written by myelf and this is very, very difficult for me to do so. Once your dream pond has been completed and you have your starter collection of Koi within, it is now time to carry out your daily feeding duties and your pond maintenance duties which also have to be carried out every single day, but, with a proper system, this should only take around three minutes! It is very difficult to find someone who can design and finish your pond as it should be with regards to advance thought, on-going thought, expertise and great talent. From my vast experiences of building proper Koi ponds I can only recommend one talented guy named Sean Hunter who has built magnificent, tailor-made, Koi ponds for me all over the UK. SHOULD YOU NEED TO CONTACT SEAN HUNTER, HIS MOBILE NUMBER IS , BUT IF YOU NEED A KOI POND OF TOTAL PERFECTION, THEN THIS IS THE MAN FOR YOU. IF YOU NEED TESTIMONIALS FROM OTHER KOI KEEPERS THAT SEAN HAS BUILT TOTAL SYSTEMS FOR, I CAN GET THEM FOR YOU DIRECT FROM THE CUSTOMER S MOUTH. I CANNOT RECOMMEND ANYONE HIGHER IN THIS FIELD. Sean maybe a little more expensive than his competitors but that is simply because of his attention to detail and the total quality of his work but it will last a lifetime guaranteed! Once again, building a proper Koi pond is a job for an expert and not a casual afternoon s caper for the inexperienced! Losing Nishikigoi is an expensive experience and., if your pond is not up to the task, you will be faced with problems forever. I have one friend who lives on my street only a few houses away, I only know him as Karl. He came to me a few years ago and told me he wished to build a small but proper Koi pond. I had a second-hand filter available and told him how to install the entire system which he did exactly to my explicit instructions. He often argued with my instructions such as heating and aeraration but finally complied with them.

5 It has been running for some four years or so now and is still, and always has been, crystal clear he still has yet to lose one single Koi! But he wishes to clear out some of his lesser Koi now and replace them with true tategoi!!! Karl is now beginning to see the vast difference between tategoi and tateshita! That s Koi keeping folks! PETER WADDINGTON, March 2008.