[Lee]

Dear All,

First of all, I am sorry to read/see of the 'hurt' koi. Obviously, I hope she/he heals quickly and completely.

Secondly. I believe a skimmer is an essential requirement for every pond. And, they need not be a menace....

I installed a simple pipe grill which in appearance is much like 'HORIZONTAL' prison bars across the face of all four of my skimmers....

I permanently installed the pvc bars - screwing them into the side walls with stainless screws.. The other three skimmers, I made to measure the opening and then snapped onto both ends some left over rubber (much like boots) that allows me to slide slid the bars upward or downward within the skimmer opening - depending upon the height of the pond water.

The objective of both installations is that they prohibit the fish from any injury as they effectively prohibit the fish from getting their nose into the skimmer area...

Nonetheless, they freely allow the pond water to flow into the skimmer and the surface materials to be sucked away...

I also 'always' keep an 'aquarium type fish net' over the open end of each of the return pipes on all four skimmers as this makes my having to clean the skimmer easier.

It does require my having to shake or wash off the face of the net once or twice every day...as they snag a lot of leaves, fish waste, pellets and so forth which otherwise would be sucked into the filter.

However, nothing other than surface water get's through the fish safe horizontal pvc bars and for certain nothing unwanted other than surface water get's through the fish nets...

In making the horizontal bars I simply cut to size some used some left over unused electrical pipe...as it is more flexible than plumbing pvc.

All the best,

Lee Aronfeld