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Must
the UV be placed before the biofilter?
In theory it does not matter at all but in
practice if you have a simple box type filter is must be before the
filter. Reasons are: The UV works under small pressure - water must be
forced through it while the biofilter drains under gravity. In sand
filter systems (which I do NOT recommend) the UV light comes after the
pond filter because the whole system is under pressure. Not applicable
in many cases but you can also split the flow from your pond pump - part
through UV light and part through biofilter.
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Use garden pond bottom waste on the compost heap. This organic matter is
full of mainly anaerobic bacteria which will catalyse the composting
process. Backflushings from the pond filter can be sprayed onto the lawn
or garden as a source of nitrogen fertiliser.
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Use black or opaque pipes in your pond instead of transparent low cost
plastic tubing. Since light cannot penetrate the black piping the algae
growth inside the pipe will be very considerably reduced. This means
less maintenance and also less expenditure on replacing transparent pipe
when it becomes clogged with algae.
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Measuring pond volume in USA .... Burt Ballou pointed out that in USA
most homes have a water metre which can be accessed readily. This makes
pond volume measurement simple if you start with an empty system. Just
make sure that while filling the pond nobody uses then toilet, takes a
shower does the washing up etc. All you have to do is then record the
start and finish readings from the metre to get a very accurate
indication of pond volume.
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Measuring pond volume using science .. this is worth pointing out for
its simple but brilliant bit of chemistry. Once more I am grateful to a
reader for pointing this out to me. This method depends upon a
pondkeeper using salt in the pond water. By measuring the salt
concentration in the pond water before and after adding a known amount
(lbs) of salt to the pond it is possible to calculate the pond volume
very accurately and easily assuming the salt hydrometer is also
accurate.
