How the pond system 'normally' works

The plumbing and equipment that makes this pond system work is hidden under three sections of decking.

Section A:

Stream drain and middle pond drain, both for the purpose of cleaning

Section B:

Bottom pond skimmer and filtration, pumps, UV, venturi, flushing chamber

Section C:

Electrical, tap water supply, top and middle pond plumbing and filtration

The bottom pond three inch bottom drain gravity feeds a 50 gallon settling tank (1). I really would have liked for this prefilter to be about 4 times bigger, but I just didn't have the room for it. The second stage of the filter system is the biofilter (2). It contains aprox. 80 square feet of 1/4 inch mesh netting. It also contains 40 feet of 1 1/4" corrugated sump pump hose, cut into aprox. 1 1/2" sections. The third stage is the polisher (3). It contains several layers of fiber matting media. The flushing chamber (4) is used to flush waste from prefilter, biofilter, polisher, and the top pond filter.

The external Sequence pump (6) takes suction from the polisher (3).
The submersible pump (7) in the skimmer box (5) feeds an Aqua Ultraviolet 57 watt UV system (8). The UV feeds a homemade venturi jet (9) which discharges into the bottom pond at a depth of 2 feet.
About 60% (aprox. 1200gph) of the discharge from the Sequence pump (6) goes directly to the bottom pond waterfall via the stream drain (Section A).
The remaining 40% (aprox. 800 gph) of flow goes to the top pond.

A small portion of the flow going to the top pond is diverted to turn the waterwheel (aprox. 40 gph).

The remaining flow (aprox. 760 gph) goes to the top pond waterfall.

The 650 gallon top pond has a 3 inch bottom drain and a homemade skimmer. Both feed a 70 gallon upflow filter. It has 2 layers of fiber matting media.

The top pond filter overflows into the middle pond filter. It has 4 layers of fiber matting media.

The middle pond filter overflows to the middle pond waterfall.

The 520 gallon middle pond overflows into the stream.

At the end of the stream, the '40% of flow' joins the '60% of flow' before going to the bottom waterfall.

The bottom pond is 1560 gallons.