How-To

Cleaning Your Skimmer Box

Today’s ponds are very low maintenance because of modern innovations such as up-flow filters and skimmers. Pond maintenance only takes a few minutes periodically, but ponds are not maintenance free. Once of the most common problems with ponds is that the homeowner doesn’t properly clean the skimmer and eventually plant material gets behind the skimmer pad into the area where the pump is kept. The number one failure of pumps is caused by material gathering around the pump intake, restricting the flow of water and causing the pump to overheat and eventually fail. Look over the following pictures that show hot to properly clean out a skimmer box.

The net should be emptied whenever it is full of debris. In the summer that isn’t very often, but in the fall it could be every few days as falling leaves build up in the net.

The skimmer pad should be cleaned anytime you notice that the water level in front of the pad is higher than the water behind the pad. A clean pad will have equal levels of water on both sides. As the pad clogs with tree needles and the like, it is harder for the water to flow through, you will notice the water on the back side is lower. When that happens follow these instructions.

Please note that we’ve updated our newsletter format. You may navigate through this newsletter by clicking on the page numbers below.