Spring Pond Cleaning with a Pro
We recently tagged along with Pete Gallo of Philadelphia Waterscapes during one of his professional spring pond cleanings. Gallo is a Certified Aquascape Contractor.
We asked him to give us an overview of how he goes about spring startup and filmed him on site at one of his professional pond cleanings. Of course, he has tools that not all DIYers will have in their arsenal, but we think you will glean a lot from this walk through with Pete—insights you can incorporate into your cleaning routine. Take a watch and let us know what you learn!
Our Takeaways
Here are a few takeaways and alternatives to Pete’s pro tools that we think you’ll find helpful:
- Determine the state of your pond water come spring. Can you save most of it? As Pete suggests, we agree that you should save as much of it as possible. Further, if you have fish, it’s best to wait to do large water changes in the fall when your fish are hardier.
- Pete uses two large, collapsible pools for temporary water storage. You can also use plastic storage containers, large (clean) trash bins or any large container for the same purpose.
- Use your pond pump to pump out any water that you plan to save into your container of choice, and later to discard pond water you’ve determined needs to go. Always use pro-active measures to protect fish. If you don’t already have a pump cover, covering it with a crate while you’re actively pumping water out of the pond is a great idea from Pete.
- The koi sock net that Pete uses is available on our website here. It’s ideal to keep the fish in the temporary water storage containers, so again like Pete says, they’re in water they’re used to being in. This will ensure your fish don’t get shocked by any new water.
- We love the idea of cleaning pond rocks with existing water. Great job Pete!
- If you don’t have a power washer for cleaning your rocks and equipment a nylon bristled scrub brush is a great alternative.
- Pete discusses the need for having pond detoxifier in your toolbox, “otherwise known as dechlorinators”. It’s imperative to treat your new water with this when you add tap water. You can shop our wide selection here.
- He also talks about treating ponds with beneficial bacteria which we of course carry, too. You can find that here.
- And treating ponds with a flocculant after a pond cleaning is very helpful in speeding up the settling of particles that have been stirred up.
- When re-introducing your fish to your pond follow Pete’s temperature advice. You can use one of our pond thermometers to measure water temps.
We hope you enjoyed this video and our takeaways. If you’d like more advice on spring startup read our full list of advice for DIYers here. And stay tuned for the next time we meet up with Pete and follow him “in the field”!
Article Posted: 04/19/2023 05:33:04 PM
