I have been serching for the past 4 hours for a thread I read about three days ago and I am stumped. An OP was asking a question about commercial bacteria for a pond other that Microbe-Lift. Some one mentioned a product available from Walmart that was just as effective and way mo less expensive. It came in a 4 pak and he told the OP to put in a bucket of warm water prior to putting in the pond. I just want to add to my pond in order to assist in removing muck and fecal matter. Any help will be appreciated.

Do you recall about how long ago the post was? I just searched for a half hour using the keywords you mentioned, walmart, bacteria, four, bucket, etc., and came up empty.

Scscuba1,

No one seems to like to name, product names on this matter on this site for some reason?? I don't know if it's because of a lack of knowledge about any of the products or what I am not sure, but I will take a stab at this. I have been secretly using a very well know product called MuckAway for the past 2 months now. I put a full cup that comes in the bucket out every 2 weeks. I full cup says it will treat an area about 800 to 1000 sq. feet. They look like small white pills. Just throw them out into the water much like you were throwing grass seed out on the ground and them let them go to work. I did not want to report on this yet as I was going to take some pictures this weekend of how it's been doing. I can tell you this. I have a 4 foot wide clear area all the way around my pond dang near, because of this stuff! It's funny cause you can see exactly where the yellowish clear bottom is and then where all the chara starts again in my pond. Needless to say it's been working pretty good. I will take pictures and post them on Monday and show you. It's not a fast, fast process but it's working. And the key here is to have an air station going along with it. Man that speeds things up! My air station runs 8 hours a night and that REALLY helps this product do it's job! I don't know if I have any before pictures but I will try and find some before ones and some after ones and post them on Monday so you and anyone else that has been wondering if this product does or does not work can see for themselves and make there own assesment. I think it's working for me, but your have to use it every 2 to 3 weeks like it says. What's cool is I am throwning it out around my dock area and it's clearing areas 100 feet away not just by my dock. I think thats because of the air station pushing these little guys around all over in the pond and mixing things up. Like I said I will post pics Monday. I will start a thread called 'My MuckAway Project".

That's really cool, RC. I'm anxious to see your comparison pics. As you may recall from some of my posts, my 1/2 acre pond has a lot of muck and it would be very much worthwhile to me if I could find a product that might work without having to drain and dredge the pond, even if it is just working on a slower basis and smaller scale.

One of these threads perhaps?

Bacteria

Should I use bacteria???

Bacteria in a Bag New Tech Bio

Bacteria control of FA and sludge

What your take on this?

Easy searching, paste this into the Google search box, bacteria site:pondboss.com

Stubby Steve was performing some sort of bacteria experiment, what ever happened with that? Beneficial bacteria in ponds

I know there has been some work at Mississippi State, dealing with adding different bacteria in ponds, especially with commercial catfish ponds, due to their eutrophication. However, the results were negligable saying that they didn't make a difference with any of the factors they were looking at, which included fecal matter. However, results may vary! This was done by Dr. Craig Tucker, but I cant seem to find the journal article at the moment. If I find the paper I will PM it to you. Just my 2 cents

Here's a product I tried a few years ago, they claim to have a very high bacteria count, can't be sure if it helped much but I don't have much of a problem due to the large amount of water input to the pond.

Here's the product.
http://www.flush-it.com/?gclid=CODg_rvKqqoCFUff4Aod5jDh7Q

Contact Kelly Duffie here.

All bacteria are different and work on different conditions. We always talk to Kevin Ripp (the Bugman) and often send water samples first before buying bacteria. Hasn't let us down yet.

http://www.teamaquafix.com/askthebugman.aspx

Hey, Jeff. I'm sooo glad that experiment is over, it smelled really bad! Steve said he would be happy to tell anyone his results by private message. We don't want to "step on any toes" or anything so he'd rather not say on the forum. Hope you guys are having a nice summer. Been too hot to go fishing where we are,
Stacy

I have used bacteria off and on for two years. It seems that every time I use it I get results. It cleaned up a smelly shallow area again this year. It Also seemed to control algae blooms by digesting organics in the water. I'm back to using it regularly instead of using cutrine and I am a lot happier. My other pond buddies in Central Wi have said they use it every year. They also have very fertile ponds.

You should get a reward for being such a tolerant wife.

I once had the interior of my 72 Olds muscle car all over our living room floor.

JWHAP deserves a medal for all of my antics that she puts up with.



I understand, I'm bummed but I certainly understand. I've heard so much back and forth about bacteria. Some swear by it, others say it doesn't work. I'm thinking it's another one of Bill Cody's "It all depends" scenarios.

JHAP,

I think you are right about the It all depends deal. Although bateria products are not cheep either. And if you don't follow the instructions like they say and do everything you can do to help that bateria thrive you may end up with results you may not like. I think that's one reason why you get so many different answers.

For example one guy has great success with "said" product and another guy has no or little success, but the first guy was using air in his pond 12 hours a night and the other guy wasn't using air at all. Or he wasn't using enough product cause it was to expensive so he thought he would ration it out a bit more. Or he only used it for one year and did really give it a chance.

So far its been working for me, but I am doing everything they say to do to get the best result. I have even started dragging my anchor some when I am in the boat to help stir things up. I think that helps also. Once again though I don't have a 3 acre pond to treat either. Just a 1 acre so its not near as costly. The bacteria is not cheep that's for sure but I think if used correctly it does have some merit.

Not all bacteria is created equal. Compare application rates and expect them to work right away.