Aquascape 91011 AquaForce 1000 Asynchronous Pump with Protective Cage for Ponds and Pondless Waterfalls, 1,070 GPH

Firstly, I need to add some background info. I bought this for an indoor pond for my single red ear slider turtle so skip this review if it does not relate to you. I have gone through a few filter and pump setups for my 21 year old turtle ever since I built an indoor pond with my father after I moved into my own house. After 7 years, because of this pump I FINALLY have the setup that efficiently and fully does the job required. Turtles are incredibly messy (even just one!) and it was always a struggle and an uphill battle to maintain cleanliness, and if I'm being honest, sometimes it was hard to keep up so it was often kinda gross looking on the bottom and occasionally smelly. I would always read up on things and they would always say when it comes to ponds full of fish you need a pump power to gallon size ratio of 2.5 times that of the pond size. So a 90 gallon pond you'd want a pump that pushes at least 225 gph. I figured a pond full of fish MUST equal one single turtle, right? I made tweaks here and there to accommodate a turtle but it was never quite enough. Then I thought of just upping the gph and getting a stronger pump finally but I was so afraid it would become overkill. Boy how I was SO wrong. This thing combined with my 2000 gph external canister pump has kept the bottom of my pond and the water essentially completely clean since I installed it. Most importantly, my main reason for buying this particular pump for my turtle is in fact the design. Turtles love to mess around with equipment and knock things around (including certain pumps). Three reasons this is perfect for turtles is because it's flat and can't be pushed around as well as a swiveling hose piece that reduces stress from movement, it's made to handle large debris and waste that turtles produce, and because of the cage holes that surround it let's it pull everything off the bottom as well as all around it so not much gets to settle into the rocks or whatever you may have on the bottom. In the end I have finally learned that when it comes to turtles, you probably want 5 times the gallon size in terms of a pump's gph. However I could not ask for a better design and almost all the credit truly goes to this product. I'd even say it's completely worth noting this on the package with recommended pump/filter specs so turtle owners can better find it as an option when searching. Whenever I did searches the things I have found were never quite right for my large adult turtle. Only when I looked outside the box did I find this great product. I KNOW I'll never have to get another pump ever again. It was worth every dollar spent.

I almost don’t want to write this review, but this pump has been working solid for nearly six years now. It is a beast!

Quiet and power efficient, good for my needs. I keep it on all the time.

This is a good pond pump for our needs, which is to keep the small (about 50' diameter) pond from freezing over in the winter. The flow rate, 1070 gallons/hour, is sufficient to do the job while the energy required, 55 watts, is low for this type of submersible pump. The clamshell housing seems overly large but is not a problem for us. It's pretty expensive but we got a $25 rebate directly from Aquascape that helped. We've had cheaper pumps but their lifespans were fairly short. This one seems more durable probably because it supposedly can handle some small debris that's often floating around in the pond.

I just put this in my pond. I am not using it to hook it up to my biofall, but merely to aerate the water and keep it from freezing in the winter. When the weather starts to cause freezing on my waterfall and rocks I turn off the falls. Up until using the AquaForce I used a floating deicer, which works great but gives me no water movement. I know that the water movement increases the oxygen and also keeps the water from freezing. So I have no water coming down the stream from the falls but I now have a small fountain of water. If your pond has a lot of debris you may need to pull it out the pump (unplug first), then merely rinse the debris off the outside with a hose. If you use it like I do just for the winter, at the end of the season unclip the 4 clips that hold the 2 halves together and rinse it out well, leave it open to air dry and then store til the season comes around again. Very easy to put on the connectors and it sits on the "shelf" of the pond, not on the bottom. It is important to note that Aquascapes tech support is awesome, so any questions they are the go to people. I can not speak of it as a "filter" as I am not using it that way. The price on Amazon was awesome. You can never go wrong with Aquascape, they truly stand behind every one of their products.