I have a Bio falls which also serves as a veggie filter, in addition to the
mechanical filtering. I've not cleaned mine out yet and may not. I'm not
noticing a slow down in water flow and I'm leaving the bacteria field
intact. This spring I've experienced the shortest algae bloom ever; by
several weeks. I can't swear that it's because I didn't clean my filter out
reducing the bacteria bed but what the hey! It keeps me from throwing my
back out lifting those lava rock bags out and getting covered in muck. I've
not saved enough money yet to buy the Matala filter pads that jan
recommends. ;-(

JB


"Phyllis and Jim" wrote in message
...
Phyllis and I were looking at our pond and decided that we (read:
Jim!) do not need to clean the veggie filters this year. We never do
our main pond as the fish stir the muck into the deep well and the
filter pushes it up to the veggie filters, where it settles. We have
not cleaned the veggie filters yet...may not need to at all this
year. The 1st 4 x 4 veggie filter seems to get most of the muck and
the 4 x 8 next to it has relatively little muck in it. If the 4 x 4
gets looking like jello (as it did one year0 we will clean it.

Anyone have any thoughts about leaving the veggie filters alone this
season?

Jim