Not true! Your pond is a living, breathing ecosystem that needs constant oxygen, just like the human race. If you shut your system down at night, then you can never have sufficient growth of beneficial bacteria to fight algae blooms, and your finned friends will have a hard time breathing. You can shut down a Pondless® Waterfall system, however, whenever you'd like because plants and fish are not depending on the circulation for oxygen and nutrients.
It's necessary to drain and clean your pond regularly.
If you decide to work in harmony with Mother Nature, using the five-part recipe, instead of doing battle with her, then draining and cleaning your pond should take place only once a year (at most). Clean-outs should occur in the spring, before the weather gets warm and the bacteria has an opportunity to set up.
The more filtration, the better the pond.
Believe it or not, you can over-filter a pond. Tight filter pads in your skimmer pick up the smallest particles of debris, causing you to be cleaning the filtering mechanism out constantly. Fish in the wild certainly don't swim around in bottled water. If you can see a dime on the bottom or the pond, then the water clarity is just right for your fish and filtering past that create headaches, not elimintate them.
You can't be a koi hobbyist and a water gardener.
Not true! You can raise koi and have a beautiful water garden. The koi can grow up to be just as beautiful and just as healthy as they are in traditional koi ponds - and you'll love them just as much!
Predators will eat all of your fish!
Raccoons generally won't swim. That's not to say they never swim, or couldn't stand on the side or your pond and take a paw swipe or two at your fish. Fortunately, most fish will swim to a deeper, more protected part of the pond when a predator is threatening them. The one predator with legitimate credentials is the blue heron. The Scarecrow®, a motion-sensing sprinkler that can be set up alonside your pond, ready to fire a steady stream of water at a heron, has had some degree of success in warding off these curious critters. Plenty of lily pads give them some protection and will work to minimize attracting a heron in the first place. Other protection measures include a cave-like structure that can be built in during the pond's excavation, or if you already have a pond, they can be added with a little pond remodeling. Crevices, or miniature caves, can also be created within the rock walls of your pond. S
