40,000 Gal pond questions

[AnonymousFishKeeper]

I'm building a 40,000 US Gal pond with a monster filtration system, two waterfalls, and an automatic water change system.
Could I put in 1 rtcxtsn, 1 psxrtc, 4 asian arowana, 4 giant gouramis, and 8 oscars? (Please note that the pond has demesnions of 30x20 20x7 of that area is only 4 ft deep and the rest is 10. The pond also has many hiding places that only the oscars can get in.)

Please give me any Ideas you have.

[MatsP]

Before I give you "any ideas you have", I'd like to know what your plans are so far - is this going to be a new building, or adding to an existing building, or perhaps an existing room withing an existing building?

You may want to visit your nearest large public aquarium - this is going to cost enough that you may want to even put the effort in to travel to a few different ones to see what they do.

Note also, I have never built such a large system - I doubt there are many [as in you probably can use the thumbs to count them amongst the 6000+ forum members] here that have build systems much larger than the lower end of 4 figures in gallons.

--
Mats

[AnonymousFishKeeper]

Before I give you "any ideas you have", I'd like to know what your plans are so far - is this going to be a new building, or adding to an existing building, or perhaps an existing room withing an existing building?

You may want to visit your nearest large public aquarium - this is going to cost enough that you may want to even put the effort in to travel to a few different ones to see what they do.
--
Mats

It's going to be built from scratch.
I've visited many local aquariums and spoken with many local experts.

[MatsP]

It would probably be good if you start explaining MORE of what you want to do, and then ask more specific questions. I may have some ideas, but they may also not work at all, because it doesn't match what you need to know.

When you say you have spoken to local experts, do you mean the people who designed the tanks in the public aquaria, or people who have small ponds at home? There are many different issues with building a big pond.

Larry (Apistomaster) can probably help with some information on the structural strength needed to hold 320000 pounds of water in place. I'd say poured concrete is the only realistic approach, but I'm by no means an expert.

I have no idea if this is a good company to buy from or not, but they do have pond filters suitable for large ponds:
http://www.pondsolutions.com/filters.htm

I would go for at least two, maybe even four or five, of the slightly smaller filters, rather than one single filter - that way, if something goes wrong with one, you still have some filter capacity (avoiding "a single point of failure").

Heating will be another interesting issue - large ponds are best heated by keeping the ROOM warm, so a good central heating system for the building itself will do the best job - perhaps controlled by a combination of sensors for air-temperature and water-temperature.

Automatic water-changing is easiest done by simply having an overflow system, so that you fill in water one side, and when it reaches a certain level, it just runs out the other side. You can combine this with perhaps timer to pump out water [perhaps with an secondary safety switch to avoid draining the entire pond] and a float valve to shut off the inflow of water.

This thread may also have some useful information - I only looked a the first page of 10+, so I don't know for sure:
http://www.monsterfishkeepers.com/forum ... hp?t=45235


--
Mats

[apistomaster]

Some kind of reinforced concrete structure is the only form of construction I'm aware of that is practical from a cost and strength perspective.
This "pond" is of swimming pool proportions. It seems to me that given the weather in Fort Collins, CO, that the pool would require an enclosure in order to maintain a constant warm temperature with any reasonable economy.
Underground areas at the view window locations would seem to be necessary if you wish to observe the fish well and adding windows is another design hurdle.

I know if I had such a large pool designed for tropical fish I would stock it with Heckel Discus, P. altum and/or sting rays. I've come to the conclusion that size of commercial aquariums is a limiting factor that has made them next to impossible to breed. SA Freshwater Sting Rays could also be stocked and expected to reproduce. The price of these rays would provide some return on the investment. Several rays sell for $400 up each.
I sure wouldn't dedicate such a large and expensive pool to fish that are infertile hybrids as the Pimelodids you listed or other fish that are easily obtained. I would rather use the space to make break throughs in breeding some fish that have yet to be bred regularly that have some commercial value and yet still provide interesting viewing experiences.