How to calculate the volume of a pond.

How to calculate the volume of your pond.
Hi it's Lee from the Japanese Water Gardens. Here's is a quick video to help you calculate the volume of your pond. I will teach everything you need to know to quickly and simply estimate the volume of any pond.
Knowing the approximate volume of your pond is a vital piece of knowledge that every pond keeper should possess. It will help you work out dosage rates for treatments, choose pumps and filters and let you decide on sensible stocking rates for your fish.
So let's get started.
For the purpose of this video I going to be working in metric and the results will be expressed as litres. For the calculations to work measurements should be expressed as meters. So 550cm would be expressed as 5.5m and 2550mm would be expressed as 2.55m. If you need to convert litres to gallons simply multiply the litres x 0.22.
Let's start with the easiest pond style to calculate, a basic rectangular or square pond with straight sides no shelves and flat bottom. To calculate the volume just measure the length, width and depth of your pond then multiply them all together.
Length x Width x Depth x 1000 = litres.
So let's say my pond is 5.5m Long, 2.5m Wide and it has a Depth of 1.2 m.
5.5 x 2.5 x 1.2 x 1000 = 16,500 litres.
To convert to gallons x 0.22 = 3630 gallons.
Assuming you have measured accurately your calculation will be very accurate.
The next easiest pond to calculate is a circular pond with no shelves and a flat bottom. To calculate the volume we need to measure the diameter and the depth of the pond. For the calculation we need the radius of the pond so we divide the diameter by 2. We then multiply everything together .
Radius x Radius x Depth x 3.14 x 1000 = litres.
Notice we use the radius twice and 3.14 which is a rough approximation of Pi.
So let's say your pond has a diameter of 3.5m and a depth of 1.3m. We then divide the diameter by 2 to obtain the radius 1.75m.
Then we multiply everything out.
1.75 x 1.75 x 1.2 x 3.14 x 1000 = 12,500 litres.
If we want gallons we can multiply by 0.22 to obtain 2750 gallons.
As before the you will get an accurate result if your measurements were good.
So far we have dealt with easy situations with simple shapes and no shelves. But what about a more complicated shape how would we deal with a pond shaped like a kidney with a shelf down one side for example. Well my approach is to calculate the shape as though it was a rectangle with out shelves and then estimate a factor by which to reduce by.
So we need the overall length of the pond, the overall width of the pond and the overall depth of the pond. Then we imagine that it's inside a rectangle and estimate how much of the area is actually pond. We then multiply everything together.
Length x Width x Depth x Reduction factor x 1000 = litres.
So let's say the pond is 4m Long 3m Wide and has a depth of 1.3m.
I estimate that about 30 percent of the area is not actually pond and about 20 percent of the pond has been lost to the shelf area.
You can reduce a number by 10 percent by multiplying by 0.9 or by 20 by multiplying by 0.8 and 30 percent by multiplying by 0.7 and so on.
So the calculation is
4 x 3 x 1.3 x 0.7 x 0.8 x 1000 = 8736 litres.
Again you can convert to gallons by multiplying by 0.22 to obtain 1921 gallons.
Calculations done using this estimating method are going to be somewhat less accurate but for most purposes perfectly reasonable.
To take things a step further you can calculate pond volumes by splitting up the pond into manageable sections that can be calculated out using the methods I have outlined and then added together.
If you want to know the volume of a pond you are just about to fill then you could use a water meter. If you don't want to buy one outright you could hire one for a small fee.
I hope you found this video interesting. Please consider subscribing to the channel. Bye for now from Lee at the Japanese water gardens.

[@josephkimani7074]

Amaizing. ❤

[@lalunesak]

Thank you very much, it’s so helpful 💐

[@leecalladine]

Thanks for the feedback .

[@leekew2683]

Really really helpful easy explanation thank you

[@ashish8504]

Thank you sir 🙏 it is really very helpful 💞 from INDIA ...🙏

[@monteiro3977]

Fantastic video, tank's Lee 😁👏👏👏👏👏👏👏👏

[@leecalladine]

Thanks glad you enjoyed it. Many more in the works.

[@tufibulai4658]

Hi Lee why do we have to multiply by 1000 everytime, confused

[@leecalladine]

There are 1000 ltrs in every cubic metre. if we measure in meters we multiple by 1000 to get ltrs.

[@jamesmapster3733]

You can get an app on your phone that helps with this too.

[@naomitesfamichael7641]

what is it called