Water Garden Pond
Koi Pond
Hybrid Pond™
Water Garden Ponds
Water Garden Ponds are ponds that are built mainly as "landscaping" items. They are designed with the focus on "cosmetics" at the expense of Koi health and owner maintenance. A Water Garden Pond has an abundance of water plants, hence the word "garden" in the title, has fish - usually goldfish, but often with Koi, and has any mixture of waterfalls and/or streams. They are always relatively shallow - 24" deep or less. This makes them safer than other pond styles for children and pets, but makes the fish more likely to get eaten by predators such as Heron or Raccoons.
Water garden ponds use boulders to retain the vertical walls within the pond, and smooth gravel to cover the liner on the horizontal surfaces. The gravel acts as the medium for aquatic plants and slightly boosts the overall SSA for ammonia removal. The gravel also protects the rubber liner from the sun's UV rays and extends the life of the liner.
Water garden ponds are built with multiple water plant shelves to accommodate all types of aquatic plants. The result is a relatively small "Deep Area" - which is the safest of all three pond styles for children and pets.
Water garden pond filtration systems are relatively simple. They feature a pond skimmer and a waterfall filter only. They use submersible pumps and waterfalls as the source of water aeration. They use aquatic plants to absorb algae-causing nitrates from the water and do not have UV Clarification. The result is clear water "most of the time", but periods of "green water" occur especially in Spring and early Summer months.
Water garden filtration systems are designed to be part of the cosmetic appearance of the water garden - they become the waterfalls themselves. They are buried in the ground and are virtually "invisible". These types of filters are known as "Pad-&-Media-Bag" style waterfall filters and are marketed with only "Annual Cleaning" required.
Being part of the waterfalls and being "invisible", "Pad-&-Media-Bag" style waterfall filters are very difficult to clean as seen here.
Until Russell Watergardens invented the Easy to Clean, Fully Backwashable Hydro Vortex™ filter with the HydroFlush™ Backwash System - water gardens were considered difficult to clean.
Water garden "Pad-&-Media-Bag" filtration system manufacturers market these products primarily to landscaping companies - who in turn, market them to homeowners as landscaping features through Home Shows and other landscaping related shows. Water garden ponds are the least expensive, and most popular of the three pond styles.
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Koi Ponds
Koi ponds are designed specifically for the health and well being of Koi. They are not designed as "landscaping" features but as "homes for the raising and keeping of Koi". A Koi pond is usually 4'-5' deep or deeper with "straight down" sides instead of the stair steps of water gardens. This helps to prevent predators from accessing the Koi by standing in the pond. This depth, and design makes them safer for Koi, but much less safe for children and pets than water garden ponds.
Koi pond filtration systems are always backwashable and relatively easy to clean as compared to water garden ponds. Koi pond filtration systems are external and not part of the landscaping. This makes them much easier to clean and service, but they are visible unless placed inside a structure of some sort.
Koi ponds may not "look" as attractive in the landscape as a water garden pond, but is a much safer and healthier environment in which to raise and keep Koi. They do not have rocks, gravel, or aquatic plants that could possibly harm Koi in any way. They are "bare liner" ponds - kind of like a swimming pool for Koi.
Koi ponds utilize centrifugal pumps to keep all electrical motors out of, and away from the water to avoid any potential electrocution. They use a combination of bottom drains and a surface skimmer with submerged aeration, circulation and UV Clarification.
Koi ponds do not have aquatic plants to absorb algae-causing nitrates from the water so weekly water changes of 10%-15% are required. Koi ponds utilize submerged aeration as the primary oxygen source and usually do not have waterfalls as a part of the filtration system.
The vertical walls of a Koi pond are retained "behind" the liner. Usually concrete, concrete blocks, or wooden timbers are used to prevent the earth from "collapsing" into the pond's deep excavation.
Koi pond filtration system manufacturers market directly to Koi hobbyists through Koi hobby magazines and Koi retailers. Very few landscape contractors install Koi ponds because of the knowledge and expertise required. Koi ponds are the most expensive of the three pond styles, are most favored by Koi hobbyists, but are not considered "landscaping features" so they aren't as popular and widely installed as water garden ponds.
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Hybrid Ponds™
Russell Watergardens invented Hybrid Ponds™ as a combination of the two above pond styles. With the creation of Russell Watergardens' revolutionary Hydro Vortex™ waterfall filters, pond owners can easily clean and backwash the filtration systems similarly to Koi pond filtration systems.
A Hybrid Pond™ combines the best cosmetic attributes of water garden ponds with the best Koi health attributes of Koi ponds. Like Koi ponds, a Hybrid Pond™ has NO GRAVEL, has bare liner on all horizontal surfaces, are no less than 3 feet deep, utilize bottom drains, surface skimmers, submerged aeration, and UV Clarification.
Like water garden ponds, a Hybrid Pond's™ filtration system becomes the waterfalls and is invisible. It uses smooth boulders inside the liner on the horizontal walls as retaining walls. It has one "perimeter" water plant shelf for water plants to absorb nitrates and limit water changes. Since there is no gravel in a Hybrid Pond™, all aquatic plants are placed on the plant shelves in baskets. The baskets let the plant roots consume nitrates from the pond, but also prevent the plants from "over-growing".
Hybrid Pond Hydro Vortex filtration systems become beautiful waterfalls. The waterfalls and filtration systems can be customized for any size pond, with any sized fish load, and any size waterfalls that you can imagine.
A Hybrid Pond™ has a smooth, bare liner bottom sloped toward a bottom drain that is placed below the waterfalls. An air stone is placed above the bottom drain to aid submerged aeration and circulation with air supplied by an air blower. As the air bubbles move upward, water from the bottom of the pond is pulled upward, and water from across the pond bottom is pulled towards the bottom drain. As the bubbles reach the water's surface and "spread outward" they push floating debris towards the pond skimmer - making both the bottom drain and pond skimmer more efficient at removing debris.
A Hybrid Pond™ uses either a submersible pump, or a centrifugal pump to pull water into the HydroClean™ skimmer off the surface of the pond and the bottom of the pond via the bottom drain. Water is then passed to the Hydro Vortex™ waterfall filter with the HydroFlush™ Backwash System. A second pump, a smaller magnetic driven HydroMag™ pump inside the HydroClean™ skimmer increases the efficiency of the skimmer and pushes water through a HydroUV™ Clarifier to keep the water clear all year round. The water exiting the HydroUV™ is then used as a submerged circulation jet at the opposite end of the pond from the bottom drain to help force debris towards the drain for removal from the pond.
The appearance of the pond is that of a water garden pond un till you look down into the pond and see its depth, straight down sides (after the single plant shelf), and perform a simple and easy backwash of the filtration system.
A Hybrid Pond™ is designed for maximum waste and debris removal for a cleaner environment in which to raise and keep Koi, and is constructed close to Koi pond depths for Koi safety and maturity.
Russell Watergardens markets Hybrid Ponds™ directly to educated pond owners, Koi hobbyists, homeowners that understand and appreciate "value", and to the elite of landscaping contractors.
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