heh - I am rural too I know the feeling. no lights in my pool, they attract too many bugs.
I run my little toy pump between 6 and 8 hours presently, but I have a cover on the pool most of the time. I adjust times for whatever is working. over the winter 2 or 4 hours was plenty. when I first started cleaning the gunk off the bottom last month, I ran it 24 hours for a few days.