use polyester fiber. but dont put it in a side chamber and divert only some
of the water there. my veggie filter doesnt do well with fines either until
later in the summer when the roots really get to the bottom and the fines
are what I clean up outof the veggie filter in fall. Ingrid


"DavidM" wrote in message
...
(It's a bottom fed, top outlet housing, filled with course floor
scrubbing pad pieces. http://www.skippysstuff.com/biofiltr.htm)

I've been using a homemade Skippy with my small 1000 gallon pond for
about two years. It's a vast improvement over the previous Oase filter,
it would need constant cleaning during the summer. The new Skippy is
happy to run all season without much attention, and maintains good water
quality.
As a biofilter it cannot be faulted. However, one downside is that the
filter medium does not provide sufficient mechanical filtration to trap
and remove silt from the water. As a result my pond has been murky for
quite a while.
Of course the reason the old filter needed such regular cleaning is that
the fine partials were blocking it's fine filters. That in mind, I would
be interested to know if others using the Skippy filter have a method
for removing dissolved solids such as silt, that wont cause blockages.
Perhaps I need to use a higher tank for the filter, in order to achieve
some more gravity driven sedimentation, or maybe even sand in the bottom
to trap particles... any thoughts?
regards
DavidM


--
DavidM
www.djmorgan.org.uk