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Steps 9 to 12
The pond has given me many hours of pleasure. It has been an interesting exercise to build it also. I have had frogs, garden snakes, herons, racoons, birds, and an otter visiting. The koi I had seem to have disappeared. I no longer try to keep fancy fish as the predators seem to treat this pond as their free lunch place. At 30 inches it is too deep for the herons to stand in, but they can swim and fish. The same for the racoons. I watched the otter munch down 3 of my biggest fish. I have not seen it again, but I imagine it still visits.
The maintenance consists of topping up the water level about every 2 weeks or when needed. Every 2 years I pump out the water, catch any fish and clean out the leaves, etc. that are causing too much algae growth; feed the deep water plants, refill the pond, fix any edging problems and restock the fish. The Japanese garden area takes more attention to detail in keeping the weeds cleaned up and keeping the plants trimmed. My seating area is overgrown with clematis and delphiniums. The edging plants are slowly filling in the edges. I am on my second pump (in 8 years), which is not too bad, considering I run it all year around and 24/7. The pond changes from year to year.
On April 24, 2019, I bought a new Aquascape Ultra water pump Model 800, which is to pump 800 gph, for $183.89 from Wildwood Outdoor Living (Cannor). I got a few parts I needed to connect it to the waterfall on the splitter, from Bartle and Gibson. Hooked it all up and set the flow to go out to the waterfall, attached the old filter, put it all into a plastic mesh bag, attached to a string so I can bring it up without pulling on the cord. Plugged the cord into the additional plugin post (the 25 ft. cord is not long enough to reach the plugin) and turned it on. The flow is just right. I will have to be more vigilant about keeping the filter clean as the flow has slowed down a bit now on May 9th, 2019.
Should you have children living near you, you will find that a pond is irristable to them.