If my pond is 1000 gallons of water, how many gallons of water at a time and how often can I add municiple, chlorinated-chloromine containing tap water straight from the garden hose?

Will adding a little (how much) to 1000 be safe, as the biofilter will break it down?

Well first of all, I wouldn't add water from a garden hose... they can have contaminants and toxins in the rubber hoses. Most of us just use buckets of water, or water pumps/hoses designed for ponds. Please consider pitching the garden hose to fill your pond.

Anyway, it has been my understanding that you can change up to 20% of the water in your pond (regardless of the size) without using water conditioners. After that, it really becomes unsafe if you are on any kind of city water.

Dear Aquarium, thanks for the response and input. I wont use a garden hose anymore.

question:

I have had a lot of aquariums before - i never heard of doing 20% water changes without adding conditioner.

(I live in a town which uses chlorine and probably anything else to treat the water in nj.)


What will happen to the chlorimine and chlorine in the tap water introduced from the 20% water change - will it break down soon enough not to harm anything. IF so, this means that when my pond looses say 100 gallons out of 10000 then i can add tap water, if you are correct. I hope to know for sure, because i think that the effects of cholorimine/cholorine are permenent on fish and amphibians and can add up. Therefore, if doing a 10-20% water change (i would do a 10%) with municiple city water is not in fact 99% safe, then after a few years there will be problems. Can you or someone check let me know?


Thanks

Some water conditioners will even say fewer than 40-50% is fine w/o using water conditioners. I say under 20% is OK. It doesn't come up in readable levels to my knowledge.

will the present, undedectable levels themselves dissappate - even choloromine with nitrifying bacteria?

Oops, I've used an old garden hose for 7 years! No problems for me. Lucky me, I have well water. If I had city water, I would probably be paranoid and add dechlorinator with every water change so as not to chance burning my fishies' gills. If it's chlorine in your tap water, letting the water splash across the surface will help dissipate the chlorine. That coupled with aeration, and the chlorine will leave the pond as chlorine gas over a few days and be okay. If you have chloramine, it's going to stay around longer. I suggest a dechlorinator in that case which will help deactivate the chlorine but leave ammonia there. Some dechlorinators have an ammonia neutralizer as well or your biological filter can take care of that.

Some, not all, hoses have contaminants in them. Obviously, if 7 years has gone by with no adverse effects you should be fine. I guess it would be one of those things to do "at your own risk". B)