I maintain a residential pond for kids to learn on and anyone to join in on a game of pick-up.
Looking to improve my ice maintenance via this website.

This is definitely the place to be! I've gotten some great tips for my backyard rink from this site and forum!

Welcome! I also help maintain a small pond by my place for the kids to skate or play a game of pick up on! So far my number one tool has been a small portable gas water pump!!! I happen to have a 1" pump that puts out 30-40 gal/minute. It's connected to 100' of 1-1/4" hose. I've Been using it to resurface our pond after some kids shoveled it of, leaving most of the snow in the middle (made a mess after a warm spell!!) that took me and another dad almost a week of work in the evenings to repair the damage!

The next best tool is my home-boni. Mine is oversized, made from 1" PVC and is 6 feet wide. I'm not using any cloth with it, just as a way to get an evenish coat on the ice quickly. It still takes almost 20 passes to coat the surface.

Oh and if you don't have one, one of those small lightweight snowblowers works really well for clearing the snow down to the ice! Beats trying to push around a shovel!!

Now I'm just waiting for end of season sales to pick up a 36" wide rink shovel to make cleaning up between "periods" faster.

Welcome aboard!! It's good to see other pond skaters here!!

I have a Ingersol Tractor with a 4' snow blower. My Home-boni is a 65 gallon tank in the utility trailer with a 4' pvc spreader bar (covered with a towel). I've always used cold water, but next year I hope to install a hot water outside tap. I just purchased a 4' snow-pusher lite shovel. This could be my best investment yet. It will save a ton of time clearing off the ice after snowblowing and between periods. Next purchase is a 36' manplow. I like the water pump idea, thanks.