Thinking About A Pond

[vancouver]

There was a hot tub here when we moved 3 yrs ago.. and it just wont work..

I always toyed with the idea of turning it into a pond, and recently my dad has kind of been into it.

I'm curious about the prices of pumps/filters.. I've never looked at them so I really have no idea.

It's a square hot tub.. maybe 6x6x5.. I don't know exactly.

Has anyone done this before? convert an old hot tub into a pond?

Any ideas/help would be appreciated!

 

[GoldLenny]

Actually, the hot tub should have a pump, filter system and plumbing, etc. All you would have to do is get a rebuilt water pump, close off all the air bubble valves and run the plumbing to a larger filter system to replace the smaller one that is probably on it. It should have a bottom drain and skimmer.

It would be quite easy to modify into a pond and if the heater system still works, you might even be able to keep it at 65F-72F year round and not have to go through the over wintering issues. They do use a lot of energy to heat during the winter though so you might want to go down to the low 60's. I had an outdoor hot tub that was partially buried to take advantage of geothermal heating to help save on the cost of keeping it "hot" during the mild winters down here.

 

[vancouver]

The tub was cemented into the ground.. so none of the pipes can be fixed.. and apparently there are serious problems with the pipes..

I think we're just going to leave it as a non working hot tub.. there goes my pond scheme!!!

 

[GoldLenny]

Wow... whoever did that should be strung up! LOL

Well, in that case, you should seal off all the openings to any pre-existing plumbing and you would have to add a large enough external filter system.

The fact that it's in the ground and 5' deep would help make it better for overwintering since the bottom of the pond would be kept warmer by geothermal heating.

Based on the 6'x5' (squarish?) measurements and I'll go with a 4' average depth since I'm sure there is seating sections, your "pond" would hold around 900G US.

Get an external filter system (is it possible that the skimmer on the "pond" would still be useable?) for that size pond and install one of the intakes on the bottom and if possible another intake in the skimmer reservoir.

I think you should give it a try but don't get any Koi as the dimensions aren't long enough for Koi. You could have around 10 shubunkins/comets. That might be too many considering there isn't much surface area but it would depend on if you added a fountain or waterfall to aid in aeration/surface agitation to allow for proper gas exhange.