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It seems that where the water comes into my grow bed, a pond has developed and even when the bell siphon drains the rest of the bed, that section remains flooded.

When I turn the pump off and the bell siphon begins to drain, then the whole bed is emptied including that section. However, as long as the pump in running that one square foot section remains wet and full.

Any suggestion to what might be the issue? I am thinking debris buildup, however I did dig down into the media in that section to see if that might help ... but had no better results. Anyone else having a similar issue?


Any and all help would be greatly appreciated.

Bob

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Just guessing here - but if your pump is on, it sounds to me like the water coming into the bed is not draining through the media as fast as the water is coming into the bed; this would result in a pond like area regardless of any debris buildup. I think the water moves through my media slower than I would have expected - and my beds are practically brand new still. If it bothers you, perhaps you could add a bar with multiple holes to allow adding water to the grow beds at multiple points - this should keep water from backing up in any one area.

Good suggestion Daniel and thanks.

I should have mentioned that this is a problem that has just developed in the past week.
Before that the flood and drain process had no such problem. Worked flawlessly with the current flow rate in and out.

I have tried adjusting the flow rate which only seems to affect the ability of the bell siphon to drain the bed. Without the proper inflow of water to trigger the bell siphon to drain, it keeps the bed flooded. So there is a nice little balance to inflow and outflow which up until a week ago was not even an issue.

Any other thoughts, suggestions or clues?

Bob

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