The Importance of Pond Filtration
Water and filtration go hand in hand. It is the reason you probably have filtered water in your home or opt for bottled water. There are three main occurrences of naturally purified water: mechanical, biological, and evaporation. The first is mechanical, as water is along the surface of the earth it can pass through soil, gravel, and rocks into aquifers that can be drilled into as a water source. The next is biological with water passing through forests, grasslands, or wetlands and plants absorbing chemicals from the water and helping to compete for nutrient loads. The final form, is through the evaporation. This process separates water from other materials at a microscopic level for evaporation and when it condensates creating rain there is only water left. Does this sound familiar to ponds? If so, that is because the filtration that naturally occurs in nature is so meant to be replicated in ponds.
Mechanical
The mechanical filtration found in pond is through the use of filter pads. Coarse filter pads will large pieces of debris like water passing over gravel, and fine filter pads will collect small pieces of debris like water passing through a slightly porous rock.
Biological
Biological filtration can happen in ponds with certain types of aquatic plants. Here is an article to learn more about how aquatic plants can help filter water. Filtration systems also provide a biological component to the filtration process. BioBalls or ceramic media are used at the base of the filter to allow beneficial bacteria a place to grow and colonize. Beneficial bacteria compete directly with unwanted bacteria in the pond for their food source stunting their growth and ability to take over your pond.
Evaporation
Just kidding, evaporation from your pond is not ideal considering you are not able to control where the rainwater later falls, and you don’t want to empty your pond. However, there is a source of filtration the resemble the microscopic filtering power of evaporation and that is UV Technology. The power behind UV technology is that is able to break apart the microscopic cells away from the particles of your pond water as it passed by the UV bulb filtering clean water back into your pond.
Make sure your pond is receiving proper levels of filtration and enjoy the beauty of clean and clear water with the use of mechanical, biological, and UV technology filtration.