Tetra Pond Filtration Fountain Kit, Includes 3 Fountain Attachments

Last one I had lasted 6 years, until I broke the shaft of the pump motor.This new one works like a charm!

I decided to buy this filter for my outdoor turtle pond setup. It's a 230 gallon kiddie pool that has one aquatic turtle in it and it usually gets dirty pretty fast. So far, this filter has done a great job at keeping the water clear! I used to have to do complete water changes every week, but now the water stays cleaner for a long time. It's been 1 month and still no need for a water change! I just spray the filter pads off with the garden hose every 1-2 weeks and do minimal spot cleaning for small debris spots on the bottom of the pool floor. The box does float a little bit, but can be fixed by just putting some rocks inside the box underneath the filter pads or you could put a rock or brick on top of the box. The fountain attachments are pretty decent. The connectors take some trial and error to figure out which ones fit where. There is also a flow control knob on the side of the nozzle to control the size of the fountain spray. I did make a quick video of this fountain on youtube just in case anyone would like to see it in action. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=17gBjAUUEb4

Works really well for the price. You, of course, have your ponds destiny in your own hands as with most filters, i.e., the media you choose to place inside, how you choose to set this up, etc, but my main thing is PRICE.A similar unit at Fairfield Gardens, a garden center near my house is priced at $150. Now, TetraPond is not a cheapo no name brand, and I was surprised to see this for $50 here on Amazon. I was content on letting my pond (no fish of course) just rot, or empty it completely, because of the exorbitant prices at the local garden center, I mean, talk about getting your 30 pieces of silver; Thank god for Amazon because now I see that these filters are probably $20 (or less) to manufacture, ship, and sell to us, and these garden centers make a 500% or more markup on them which should be a crime, but, who's the moron for shopping there and has two thumbs?<--------- THIS GUY

This filter was very easy to put together and assemble. It doesn't have a lot of options for the length of the fountain, though having several fountain shape options is nice. It's held up really well over a few years of use but does use a lot of energy and not the easiest to disassemble to clean. Also have to get separate media for your bacteria (plastic wheels, etc.) that are not too small as the hose is very large. Has also held up really well with a large turtle, which is a feat!

"Please to www.tetrapond.com for installation instructions" !?! You're kidding me. I did, and couldn't find any. 2/3rds of any info they provide is about other products you can buy if this one doesn't work, but they couldn't just print how to put the dang thing together? It's got about 30 different parts with no instructions on how to put it together. Bad business practice. I may give one more star or two if I can get the thing to work. Plus the filtration box is HUGE for the small pond it advertises for.UPDATEDespite the lousy instructions, I was able to put the kit together and get it working. On its own/as is, it did a lousy job. After assembly and adding rocks to keep it from floating, I did a 50% water change and then put it to work in my (then) 35 gallon pond that had become murky after sudden onset of prolonged warm weather. Mind you, I put the pump on the lowest setting because of the small size of my pond, but I still expected more. After 24 hours of running the pump and filter, I saw absolutely NO difference in water clarity. Given that even after a decent water change, the pond was still pretty murky, I thought maybe the filters just clogged up a lot and needed a rinse. After taking them out, there was hardly any debris or junk in the filters, which told me the filters weren't actually filtering at all. However, after modifications, I got it to not only work, but work well. See the pros and cons for more info.Pros-The pressure/ strength of water flow is adjustable - the instruction manual is very vague about how to adjust it, but it can be adjusted. If a too strong of water flow is stressing your fish out, you can turn it down, or turn it up for larger ponds.-The fountain itself works well, and can be adjusted as stated above-The filter can work well, but ONLY after purchasing additional products. My water is crystal clear now, but only after major modifications and extra cost.Cons-The nearly useless instruction manual. One would think that a large company might be willing to pay a knowledgeable employee a few hours work to put together a manual that explains how to actually assemble and use their product.-It floats. If a product is designed to work under water, why does the design float?? I added some clean rocks in the large extra space under the filters to remedy it, but including that info in the product description would be helpful.-It's HUGE and unsightly. For a small pond, it takes up a lot of space and definitely takes away from the 'natural' look that most people want for a pond or water feature.-The provided filters are absolutely useless with out modifications and will not clean up toxins or ammonia created by fish waste. After 24 hours of use using only what came with the kit, I didn't even notice the slightest difference in water clarity in my small pond (see introduction). To remedy this I bought a fine particle carbon coated sheet filter to put above the filters that came with the kit, as well as a carbon sack that I put in front of the intake from the filter to the pump (cost about $20 for a about 3 month supply). After even just a few hours of running with the additional filters, I noticed a significant difference in water clarity!! After about a day and 1/2 my water was practically crystal clear. Also, carbon not only helps filter the debris in water, but neutralizes toxins or ammonia buildup. Even if the filters that were included with the kit worked at filtering debris (which they didn't), they wouldn't filter out toxins.In summary: Out of the box, tricky to figure out how to assemble it, but the fountain works. The filter only worked after modifications and extra cost. After the ad ons, it significantly cleared up my little pond fairly quickly. Three weeks after purchasing the fountain kit I upgraded my pond to 100 gallons. Initially the water was a bit murky from dirt on the gravel I put on the bottom, but the filter (with modifications!) cleared it up within a day and the water has been crystal clear ever since.SO! I gave some stars for the fountain working. Negative stars for the filter working only after having had to buy other products to make it work.Advice to the manufacturer:-I would make a better instruction manual. Even some illustrations of the parts and how they fit together would make customers happier. -Also, include a fine particle carbon filter to make you otherwise completely useless filter to actually work.-Can you make it smaller? It seems ridiculous to have such a HUGE filter box that doesn't even work. You could probably redesign it to be smaller by including filters that actually work, but efficiently.

I love this pump so much I ordered two. It is very durable. Fairly easy to clean. The pump is powerful. I have one that pumps water to the top of a faux waterfall, about 8 feet of tubing rising 3 feet. I live in zone 7 and I’m lazy and leave them out year round. My only complaint is that because of the filter box sticking out so far I can not use it in some of my preformed ponds that have a narrow bottom. I would recommend this for ponds that have a flat space of 1’ by 2’ at least to accommodate it’s size. It is powerful and quite. The suction is not high enough to hurt even the smallest feeder fish. I like the variety of heads you get with the fountain attachment; I usually opt for bell to keep down splashing.