Got an inquiry from someone on the EliteRinks.com site, asking what tools he would need to take his neighborhood pond and make the ice good enough to skate on. I've never done any more than shoveling off some snow, so curious what you all have to say. My question to him was around ice thickness and what the current state of the ice was, but without those answers, what would you say?

Never done made pond ice as an adult - just remember shoveling the snow off as a kid and skating. Why wouldn't you address the situation the same way you would address your back yard rink - by using a homeboni or rinkrake?

If you are too far from a hose connection, I've heard of people drilling a hole in the ice and dropping a pump into a lake and just using the lake/pond water to flood the ice.

What do the people at the NEPHC do to make their rinks?

I'm waiting for his response on the current condition of the ice. I think if it's just a bit bumpy, then yeah, a light resurface would work. Whether that's done using a hose or hole/pump depends on what they have available, I guess.

Honestly not sure what they use at the NEPHC...I imagine it's a hole and pump setup considering proximity to a spigot (or lack thereof).

This is my first year on maintaining our pond rink other than just shoveling it off but so far this is what I think is must haves:

1) Quality shovel. For some reason, it seems to me that plastic shovels work better than the metal ones.
Also a push broom does a decent jobs on some of the "hard to get" snow that fights ya.

2) Some type of ice scraper to get out those odd ice lumps and leaves/pussy willows that keep showing up.

3) A good pair of chemical gloves for flooding...gotta keep those hands warm.

I don't know if there is a big difference between what is needing for a pond rink as opposed to a back yard rink.

I am currently dragging out over 300+ feet of garden hose to the pond to flood and the wheels are turning on how to do that all more efficiently next year.......

We just finished "rescuing" our local pond. Some kids only shovelled off part of it the last time they skated, and then we had a bit of a melt, resulting in mounds of frozen trash on varous spots in the middle of the pond making it unskatable!!! Me and a few dads got together over the last 4 nights and have made it skatable again. We're 80-90% there, but it took alot of scraping, chiselling and flooding to bring it back. The essential tools for this work are

1) a pressurized water source, or a portable pump. We purchased a small engine driven pump from a local kijiji add, (similar to this: ) also get a length of hose long enough to reach at least half the distance of your rink surface. we're using 50' of 1/14" sump pump hose (its cheap, about $8 for 24' so when it gets ruined, its not a big deal)
The pump is also good for erroding the high spots. One thing we had to modify on the pump was the rubber feet, they just slide around on the ice!! the torque of the motor will make the pump walk away from the hole! We drove a screw through each rubber foot so the point was facing down into the ice. It no longer walks around when its running!!

2) scrappers and shovels to clear and fix up any lumps and junk on the ice

3) either a small auger to drill a hole in the ice to get to the water ( or an axe to do the same)

4) water proof gloves!

Our repair has taken 4 nights so far. The first 2 nights took the most time. It was a lot of scraping and chiselling to "delete" the mess that was on the ice and alot of flooding to even out he surface. The first two nights we ran the pump for an hour each time ( at 120l a minute, thats nearly 1800 gallons of water). On the thrid night we ran it for 45 minutes and were happy with the result. Last night we had 80% of the ice looking nice and smooth so only had to run the pump for 20 minutes to get the flood we wanted on the ice. A couple more floods and I think we'll be in shape to start using a home-boni on the ice to maintain it!

which leaves the last item

5) a home-boni or rink rake(google it) to maintain the ice surface.

This is my first year doing this at the local pond but the local parents (dads specially) have been really receptive to the idea and have come out to help with things! We're going to put up a sign ( maybe next year with councils approval) to try and get people to clear off ALL of the ice when they use it.

Great, great advice everyone. Thanks a ton. Might just point him here!

(And welcome, PCMM. No need to google the homeboni...we have instructions right on the site!)

Perfect Joe, I didnt see them. This year has been a challenge, the weather has been on the brink of ice making all winter (hasnt really been winter, we only had snow for a couple of weeks up here)

the big saviour for our pond has been the pump! without it, it would have taken at least twice the time to fix things ( and my back would be in alot more pain!!) Once it's all fixed, and skated on I'll post some pics! I'm already getting ideas for next winter to put a bench down closer to the ice, and setting up a better piping system to get the water from a different spot so I'm not always drilling and repairing holes in the ice!!

Now THAT is the kinda pump I am talking about!!!!! I have got to get one of those for next winter!!

But what do I do now with over 300+ feet of garden hose??? :)

Put some of it up for sale on kijiji!! Now I need to find a 2 inch ice auger (similar to the ones they use for ice fishing) the closest thing I can find is a gardening earth auger , looks like I'm going to have to modify it to have better cutting teeth for gettnig through the ice cleanly!