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I just saw the discussion on my favorite topic - waterfalls and ponds so I will jump in and comment on a couple of points. First, kits. I have never fooled with kits because they didn’t fit my needs. They sold parts I didn’t use. I get my liner for .35 cents /sq ft. and I doubt if kit liner is this inexpensive. Keeping the cost down is just as important as making a beautiful waterfall. So I shop around a lot for specials and the best deal.
Trees hit the nail on the head twice. Here I thought I was the only one who made my own skimmers. I make my own skimmer that works just as well for $20. I buy filter media in bulk and use fiberglass window screen for my leaf net/filter. I dig a hole in the side of the pond roughly the size of a skimmer and make my own hand carved 1 piece manufactured rock to use as the skimmer face plate. I leave a hole the same size of a professionally made skimmer in my skimmer face plate. With this method I save a ton of money and a lot of time not installing a skimmer box. If you re going to mke your own skimmer, size it correctly relative to the gph rating of the pump.
No one has given me a believable and PROVABLE reason to use a pure falls. And I can give a couple of reasons why pure falls aren’t the best thing to do. At an average of $250 for a pure falls and $250 for a skimmer, that is $500 of cost. I take $20 out for my skimmer materials and take that $480 and apply it to a second pump which gives me more gph which gives me more square feet of water falling beautifully which gives my customers a bigger waterfall for the same amount of money which wins me the contract which makes me more money which makes my girlfriend very happy
PUMPS to me the pump is the #1 most important part of the project. I will skimp on anything but the pumps and I don’t even like to use just 1 pump. Two is the minimum for me. My preferred pump is the t10000 torpedo pump by cal pumps. It supposedly puts out 10,000 gph and can be had for around $250. But someone needs to rewrite their gph performance specs. Think about this guys. Do you really believe that a 5,000 or 10,000 gph which I translate as gallons per hour pump could fill up 5,000 or 10,000 one gallon milk jugs in 1 hour? Something smells awful fishy to me. It would be a tremendous service if you all would get some of the different brands of pumps and see how much gph they really put out. With each of you using different pumps, we could easily get the truth.
ABOUT AQUA SCAPES sorry but I am not a big aquascpes fan at all in fact I feel they are doing waterfalls and ponds a disservice. First, probably 90% of their sales is the sales of products. Therefore they build up this “system” philosophy which is just a justification to buy the full range of their products so they can make more money. Buy our totally unnecessary pure falls because it is part of our system. Buy our lot more expensive flex pipe. Don’t go to home depo and buy larger size pvc pipe that delivers more gph for less money. Second, aquascapes encourages and equips people to make smaller waterfalls and ponds. As professional landscapers it is our job to get people as much beauty, benefits and enjoyment as possible. We should dissuade people from wanting small little waterfalls and the small little amount of waterfall beauty, benefits and enjoyment small waterfalls give. Furthermore if aquascapes teaches people to build their own waterfalls and ponds, doesn’t that cut into our ability to make money? Finally I don’t like aquascapes because they teach people to make streams which compared to a waterfall are highly disadvantageous. Then they turn around and use highly ugly 1 foot egg rock. I could say a lot more about aquacapes but I am not going to do it here.
In order to make a big amount of profit we have to think big - 2 pumps instead of 1, all 4 types of man made waterfalls not just 1, a big project not a small one. If you want to sell small create a small amount of waterfall desire but if you want to sell big create a big amount of desire for a big waterfall.
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