It can be exciting to add a garden pond to the backyard. Everyone has a vision of how much more beautiful the entire outdoor living area will be with a sparkling pond and waterfalls to admire. They see this new landscape element in full bloom with perhaps some vibrant colored koi or fantails darting about in the clear water. It isn’t difficult to achieve such a focal point unless you overlook one very vital part of your vision.

The right pump for your garden pond is crucial. Even without adding ornamental fish to ponds, without the toxic chemicals that pond pump becomes an intrinsic part of your water quality system. Waterfalls can’t do the entire job of maintaining crystal clear water in your new pond. If your pump is too small or too big for the volume of water in the pond, several important things can go wrong and result in you having a high maintenance garden pond… or worse!

The water pump doesn’t just run the waterfalls; its function in the garden pond is multi-faceted. While it is important to install the pump exactly as the directions specify, an improperly functioning pump is not always the fault of the equipment. The pump is responsible for the right rate of filtering impurities from the water. This is very important to keeping your fish healthy and alive. The pump also manages the aeration in ponds which provides oxygen that your plants and koi need to thrive in the garden pond.

In order for your pump to remain in good working condition for a long time, it can’t be too small for the amount of water it is filtering. Too much pressure on the pump can cause your garden pond filtering system to wear out from the strain. By the same token, if you have insufficient water for the size of the garden pond pump, you can also wind up with the same result. So, getting the right sized pump for the job is vital to having fun and a relaxing experience with your new waterfalls and pond.
First, before buying the pump check the capacity it was designed to accommodate to get the full manufacturer’s stated life of use from the equipment.

Second, maintaining water quality for your beautiful koi is somewhat tricky. You can have a much easier time keeping the biosystem just right for the koi and your pocketbook with well aerated water that is sufficiently filtered. Too slow of a pump in koi ponds can result in instant and complete annihilation of your fish population. Garden pond plants do add some oxygen, as does your waterfalls, but the pump keeps all of this important stuff in balance when you match it to the size of your pond. This first thing you should check if your koi are acting strange is the pH and other levels of gasses in their water. Just like you, they can quickly suffocate without enough oxygen.

Do you need an external pump or a submersible pump for your garden pond? Submersible pumps for koi ponds won’t help out much if you have a good sized pond, they are adequate for smaller ponds with fish. When shopping for submersible pumps for the garden pond, matching the gallons per hour or GPH to the needs of your water plants or fishy friends is very, very important.

Solar pumps are available for your garden pond. The problem with relying on the sun to keep your pump operating at full speed and reliably is situating it where it will always have full strength sunlight. Shade will interrupt solar collection and can be a huge detriment to life in your pond. It can also cause you to have problems with waterfalls properly operating. Solar power is great, when there is sufficient sunshine, even part shade too many hours a day can mess up the power availability.

The best solution for most backyard ponds is a magnetic pump. This gives you reliable power to keep the filtering and oxygen maintained evenly and saves on the cost of operation. Additionally, magnetic garden pond pumps are very quiet, so you won’t have irritating sounds of machinery detracting from the soothing tranquility found in your waterfalls and pond feature.