Natural Swimming Pools

Someone please explain this…

DC Reflecting Pool could’ve used some more bids. How do you know when it’s time to backwash?

Weekly NSP maintenance.
Brush. Vacuum. Swim.
It might be time.
Backwash coming soon

Day 52 - Even on vacation the natural pool skims the surface 24/7 pulling everything into the biofilter. Threw in the robotic cleaner to see how it handles the algae clinging to the surfaces. Weekly brushing coming next.

Day 51 — We’re leaving.

Wind and rain forecast.
Nobody swimming.

Let’s see what the pool looks like when we get back.

Nature is now in charge.

Day 50 — What have we learned? 💧

We watched this pool go from clear…

To green…

Back to crystal clear.

Without chlorine.
Without algaecides.
Without constantly chasing water chemistry.

Over the last 50 days we’ve talked about the nitrogen cycle, the microbiome, beneficial algae, dragonflies, mosquitoes, cryptosporidium, giardia, nutrient cycling, and what it really means to create living water.

The biggest lesson?

What most people call contaminants, nature calls nutrients.

Instead of fighting nature, we built a system that works with it.

Today, the water is clear, the ecosystem is thriving, and the pool is doing exactly what it was designed to do.

For me, that’s the most rewarding part.

Not proving that natural pools work.

Watching people realize that nature already knew how to clean water long before we started adding chemicals to it.

50 days down. Many more to come. 💧

What’s been the most surprising thing you’ve learned from this series?

Wait… you drink water from your pool?! 👀💧

Yep.

We distill it, remineralize it with Celtic sea salt, and drink it every day.

Most people would never consider drinking pool water.

Then again, most pools aren’t designed to be living water systems.

Would you try it? 🤔

Day 49 — What if we’ve been looking at pools backwards? 👀💧

Most pool owners see dust, debris, pollen, leaves, and bather waste as contaminants.

Something to kill.

Something to sanitize.

Something to fight.

Natural pools see those same things differently.

We see nutrients.

Food for the biofilter.

Instead of constantly trying to sterilize the water, we create an ecosystem that consumes nutrients before unwanted organisms can take advantage of them.

That’s the goal:

Healthy, balanced, living water.

Not sterile water.

It’s a completely different way of thinking about water quality.

Also, you’ll notice a new addition in today’s video. 🤖

We’re testing a robotic cleaner in the swimming area to see how it performs in a natural pool.

Detailed review coming soon. Link in Bio if you want to purchase one yourself!

Question:

When you think of a swimming pool, do you picture a living ecosystem or a chemically controlled environment? 👇

Dragonfly nymphs are here! 🦟 🐉

Mosquito’s worst nightmare.

They’re so fast, they make fast people look… not fast.

Day 47 — The biggest misconception about natural pools? 👀

People think they’re just ponds.

They’re not.

Look closely at the equipment pad and you’ll see something familiar:

✅ Skimmers
✅ Main drain
✅ Vacuum line
✅ Pump
✅ Cartridge filters

Just like a traditional permitted swimming pool.

The difference isn’t that we removed filtration.

The difference is what we didn’t add.

No UV.

No copper.

No systems designed to sterilize the water and disrupt the microbiome that makes the biofilter work.

Last video we cleaned the cartridge filters because we vacuum the pool about once per week, just like many traditional pools.

Natural pools aren’t maintenance free.

They’re biology-based.

And that’s a very different philosophy.

Question for you:

If you were building a pool tomorrow, would you rather rely on chemistry or biology? 👇💧