My coming project

I'm completely new here and I expect nothing of anyone, but that being said I would appreciate all thoughts, comments and criticisms as I am itching to get this project underway.

In my couple of posts so far I've mentioned that I come from the tropical/reef aquaria side of things. It's safe to say that I tend to think big with my hobbies, and I enjoy designing and building aquarium equipment as much as I enjoy the aquariums themselves.

A couple of years ago I bought a house that had not been lived in or kept up for 7 years. Not exactly tip top. It's been a long road just getting things back to par, let alone making improvements. This summer I plan to go after the yard, including the in-ground liner pool that is currently such an eyesore that I avoid looking at it whenever possible. Picture below, but this was before I owned the place. It's even worse now. I'm toldby my neighbor that there were several dead deer in it at one point.

I have no interest in a sparkly blue, inert swimming pool. I do, however, have interest in retaining the resale value should I ever sell it, so one of the challenges I'll be facing is leaving the pool itself 100% intact so a simple liner change will be all that is needed to convert back to a standard pool So this summer I plan to, among many other things, empty the pool, drop in an EPDM liner, build my filtration, and set up any flow systems. Even if I do not have filtration complete, I'd like to have a few fish in it by year's end. I think the risk of overcrowding is fairly low

My ultimate goal here is to have a partially planted swimming pond with a number of more colorful north american species that can survive winter Iowa temperatures and play reasonably well together. I've been planning out the layout for some time, but haven't had a good resource for figuring out what I should keep in it. I am very thankful to have found this forum and organization.

In the meantime, I've already got a 1500 gallon indoor liner pond built in the sunroom (to the right of the pool in the below picture) with just a couple small koi in it, so if I do identify what I'd like to keep, picking them up before the big pond is completely done definitely isn't out of line. I'm nowhere near that point, though.

Here is the mess: Am I nuts?



The pool is 18'x36', 4' at shallow end, 10' at deep. Drawn out in sketchup it measures just over 30,000 gallons. More plans to come, of course. Most things are sitting idly in my head and haven't made it to paper yet. The entire yard, all retaining walls, at least half of a tennis court, many grown trees, much of the sea of concrete surrounding the pool, etc will fall victim to a skidsteer and chainsaw this summer. I've got a lot of work cut out for me.

Does anyone foresee any obstacles that I may not have taken into account? Any thoughts, on anything at all? As I said, ALL thoughts very much appreciated.

If you managed to read all that, I very much appreciate your time!

The person with the username smbass (Brian Zimmerman) has experience with backyard ponds. He uses them to breed sunfish. Here is his website: http://www.zimmermansfish.com/

This... looks... amazing. I would be so excited if I were you. I would definitely recommend doing at least the area behind the pond as a garden to help both with landscaping and runoff water. Also, I have a 4,000 gallon or so pond that's coming along and I think that a lot of the stuff there you could use here.

Cool house. Cool Sunroom. Potential Pool.
Study up on how Europeans are doing swimming pools chlorine free. Plants. Plants. Plants.
A liner will be easily pierced by growing roots, rocks and such, but if you are wanting resale value and using a liner this creates a problem, somewhat.
You need a substrate for many species to thrive and reproduce. Gravel, rocks, sand.
Lay some old synthetic carpet on the bottom. Anacharis, Hornwort will attach and grow from that. Throw in old Christmas trees and forked hardwood limbs for structure.
With no substrate you will have fewer critter options. Topminnows, sunfish, some shiners would work i suspect.
Being the bottom is sloped you will have difficulty with any containers but try and develop something, such as hanging from the sides or containers above on the pool deck concrete.

You can keep the water clear by building a shallow 2nd pool nearby, perhaps attached with a riffle run, filling it with gravel and plants. Cattails, Iris and local emergent species which will filter the pumped through flowing water... European style.

This is an excellent opportunity, but requires a full committment not a resale real estate deal.

I did my 18 x 36 cement pond adding a gravel bed and waterfall and now swim with my fish in clear water, chemical free.

Think about routing your gutters to the pool. Fresh rain water with no mammal feces. No dirty diapers allowed. Ever, never.

Maybe a floating raft and ramp for frogs and turtles.

It will become an ongoing experiment but will get better every season with thought and effort.

Get rid of your Koi and go 100% Iowa Natives.

Thanks Erica. I fully plan to buy captive-raised from his site when I get to that point, and wouldn't have considered him as a resource otherwise. Yeahson421, I can only hope that it turns out something like "amazing," but for safety's sake I'm setting the bar a little lower! Any advice would always be appreciated!

Casper, thank you for the excellent advice. I would absolutely love to see what you've done with yours. I fully intend to have substrate where I can, and hopefully on the middle slope if I can work out a simple way for it to stay in place. If i can find an appropriate material to build with I will plan on building a terrace structure that will sit down in the deep end and support the structure up the ramp. On the north side, since it will receive 3 seasons of sun, I'll plan on suspending additional planters on iron anchored in concrete outside the pool. Short term, anacharis and carpet draped into the pool is an excellent idea. Long term, though, I plan on midwest natives only.

I'm going to draw everything up by hand this weekend. I'll take a look around at green pool design as well. It's probably not too far off from what I'm already thinking. Turtle raft: definitely. Will plan on looking for extremely large pieces of driftwood around the Saylorville area, which can be had with permission.

As for EPDM and durability/resistance to root penetration, the EPDM liner in my parents' koi pond has not given way over the course of 15 years despite being lined with softball to volleyball sized rocks - many sharp-edged - overly planted, and surrounded by hardwood shrubs. As I understand it the problems with root penetration occur at joined seams. I've put a question in to pondliner.com to see if the size I need is in fact one solid piece or smaller pieces joined together. (They're fast - it is indeed one solid piece) If my understanding isn't correct, please point me in the direction of some info on it. In any case, thank you for bringing it up as that was something that I had definitely not considered.

I can't be more adamant that I have no intention of ever leaving this home. Perfect for me, aside from taxes. Things don't always go to plan, though, so I don't want to have permanently altered what could be someone's sparklingly boring pool. As for long-term commitment: no questions there. I'm 32. Keeping fish has been my hobby for >25 years, and swimming has long been my favorite pasttime. Neither of those are going anywhere!

I'll toss up some drawings next week. Thanks to you all for your comments.

Edited by ryansholl, 12 April 2013 - 04:00 PM.

Just an update! Maybe someone's interested in an update, maybe not, in any case this makes me more apt to keep up with the project!

A few nice, warm days have passed and I was able to get into the pool for the first time, courtesy of chest waders. About two tons (guessing) of wet leaves, branches, and dead critters are now draining and drying in the shallow end, with 6" of pure slop remaining in the deep, which is just 8.5 or 9 feet deep, not the ten I originally thought. If I can find a rental trash pump locally, I hope to have the liner out and the pool completely clean this weekend.

Measurements taken, everything drawn up in sketchup. I will be installing three tiers along the long sides of the pool to allow planting, 20" high each with the top most tier bringing the substrate level to that of the shallow end and stepping down from there. I'll also be putting in a second rectangular pond above the pool, which will run via a short stream with a couple pools into the main pool, and an overflow running down the hill into an earth terraced area. Might toss an extra cut of liner at the bottom of the terraced area to try and maintain a marshy area.

I'll be felling some significant trees (I've got a lot to spare) and planting the back yard to native prairie grasses/forbs, which is what it was up til the 1950s when urban sprawl took its toll.

Thank you Casper for pointing me towards reading on the green pool idea. I'll be doing the same thing in principle, but not in implementation, primarily because from what I saw they gear towards clean water specifically without specific thought to fishkeeping.

As for stocking, would anyone be able to give me an indication of whether they suspect this system would be large enough to maintain several species (3 or so) of sunfish along with smaller fish such as minnows/dace? I'm still in stupid mode when it comes to natives!

Thanks all.