Danged Leak! But I found it!

[Julles]

So I spent two 12-hour days and 325 miles and $60 in gas (plus the $10 tour ticket) to do the Houston Pond Tour last weekend.  Come home all jazzed up, and even have three new fish to add to my pond.... got a gold koi with black speckles on his back - very cool.  One I saw on the tour had a fancy name and was very expensive.  I feel lucky to have found a similar one at the watergarden store for $5.   

My 700gph pump, which just feeds two fountains, has not been working as well as it was, so the guy at the store sold me a new magnet-rotary thing.  I installed it and it made virtually no difference.  But while I was at it, I cleaned the whole thing out, and also cleaned the 900gph pump, which feels the filter.

The next morning, my pond was LOW on water.  I mean, about 30 gallons low (out of a 550 gallon pond!)  The next morning, it was about 100 gallons down... like, about 12" down from my total depth of 30".  The fantails who are kept in a seperate container on the 1' deep shelf were NOT happy.  (no fatalities)

I checked everywhere to be sure no water was splashing or leaking.  I couldn't find any wet places outside the pond.  None of my pottery or glass globes were broken, and I just couldn't imagine a bird (or a hateful neighbor) coming into the yard and poking a hole in the liner. 

Last night, just to be safe, I turned the filter off, and left the 700gph pump going for aeration.  This morning - the water level was where it should be!  That means there is some kind of leak from the bog filter. 

Now, I have a slow leak there anyway, if the water depth gets too high, and I had to remove my pretty waterfall because it was causing water to back up behind it.  Without that blockage, the water falls into the pond at a lower level, and it doesn't get up to the problem area.

Well, it turns out that my having cleaned the 900gph pump caused it to work just a tad - and I mean a TAD - faster, so water was able to back up to that problem area, this time faster than my previous "slow leak" and enough to drain 100 gallons in 12 hours.  I fiddled and faddled and was able to mush down the liner in that area so water could flow a bit faster.  I could see it fall from the level where it was "wicking" in between two folds of the liner.  That appears to have stopped the leak, but I can't count on that to last long.

There was also a bit of goopy algae built up on the overflow into the pond, and it's possible that that helped to raise the water level just a little bit.  Oh, maintenance!

But now I do have to take the time to COMPLETELY empty the pond (which I just did in March) and COMPLETELY empty 600 lbs of gravel (which I just put in in March) and rebuild a new bog filter, refill the pond, and hope I don't loose any fish in the Houston 90º spring weather.  I was going to do this in the fall, but looks like things have been pushed ahead.  Luckily (?) my job for three days cancelled out, so I have time to do it (no money, but hey, how important is money??).

[sheepie]

Sorry about your leak  :'(     Glad you didn't lose any fish

[Ky Kim]

Sorry about you having a leak, but the good news is you found it.

Kim