Help Me Choose a Pump for my Pond

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Help Me Choose a Pump for my Pond

Monday, June 8th, 2009 Subscribe To Our Feed

We all have different reasons for building a garden pond. You may want a water feature with or without running water effects or possible want to keep koi carp or goldfish.

Pond pumps do what they say on the box. It pumps or turns the pond water. The type of pond pump you need depends on the purpose, effects and size of your pond. A pond pump may not be necessary for example if you are creating a wildlife pond you can use specific plants to help keep the water clear. However water in the average pond should be circulated every 3 or 4 hours and water in a pond for koi carp must be turned at least every 1 or 2 hours

When choosing a pond pump, it needs to be capable of pumping the volume of water in your pond. Here is a rough guide:

Work out how much water you have in your pond:Width (m) x Depth (m) x Length (m) = x Litres. E.g:

2m wide x 1m deep x 1m long = 2000 litres
3m wide x 1m deep x 2m long = 6000 litres

When you know the water volume work out the pond pump output required (in LPH) litres per hour bearing in mind the purpose (fish/no fish) as mentioned earlier

A 2000 litre pond requires a pump with at least 1000 LPH output to circulate the water every 2 hours
A 6000 litre pond requires a pump with at least 3000 LPH output to circulate the water every 2 hours

With me so far?

Pond pumps get more expensive the bigger the pond and you don’t want to make a costly mistake by choosing the wrong one! So you can always ask at the pond pumps shop for advice just to be sure.

It is always better to get a larger pump than you need, this is simply because once you have reached the limit of a smaller pump it can’t be turned up, but larger pumps can be turned down. So if you have a 2000 litre pond, don’t get a pump with a 1000LPH max output, opt for one a bit bigger.

You may also need other things from your pump such as a filter to clear small debris or remove things like blanket weed or you might also want a fountain effect. Because you will be asking the pump to work harder, having either of these will mean you need a bigger pump. However there are a great many combination pumps on the market that act as both pump and filter.

Finally, Most pump models use the output in the name such as the Oase Aquamax Eco Filter Pond Pumps or Blagdon Mini Fountain Pond Pump. These are combination pumps so you don’t need to do two separate sets of calulations for your pump and filter or pump and fountain.

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