Thread: New house, with a free pond needing new breath of life!

Hi all!
We moved into our new house a few months ago, and it comes with a free pond in the garden! I'd like to bring it back to life, and would appreciate advice from people who know more about this than I do!

It's a rectangle pond measuring around 3.1m x 1.75m x 1.4m deep. By my reckoning that's around 7600 litres / 1600 gallons.

Now to the equipment. From looking around and Googling, this is what I appear to have:
Sieve filter (50 gallon) (brand currently unknown)
EazyPod filter
Air pump (Evolution Aqua)
UV thingamebob (Yamitsu 55A)

From the position of the pump, I believe it's a gravity-fed setup.

It had been left with a couple of feet of water, looking quite green. Today I have filled it up and turned everything on. My thinking (this is where you may tell me I'm going about it wrong) is to now run it for a week or two to let the skimmer, filter, and UV do their thing. I'll then replace the K1 micro (it's old, and doubt it contains any useful bacteria) and find out how to mature it before adding Koi.

Although I've never kept Koi, I am an experienced tropical fish keeper so reasonably knowledgeable when it comes to biological filtration, nitrogen cycle etc.

I guess my main question is whether there's anything else I should be doing, or need to consider? Am I right in starting about it just by turning things on, or have I missed a crucial step? I should add there wasn't a huge amount of sludge on the bottom.

Any advice greatly appreciated!

I agree with AJM - totally empty it and pondvac it, washing down the walls etc.
But since you've filled it yesterday, I'd keep it filled for a week or so to check for the elephant in the room first - ie LEAKS!
If there's no leaks, then drain it and get scrubbing, and enjoy yourself!

Agree with all the above, but since you've already filled it you could try putting a very strong dose of Virkon into the system now to fully sterilise everything as the water circulates.

Doesn't sound like a bad little set up to inherit, a nice starter size pond and some reasonable equipment.

You'll likely need to replace the UV bulb.

As good as the easypods are, I think you are reaching its max limits with that size pond, so when you do start stocking with koi you will want to go slow and try not to overwhelm the filter.

You could also try adding a few drops of ammonia each day to get some level of maturation into the bio before adding any fish, with a view to getting your first fish from say mid-may onwards.