I am a little confused on the spring restart options for aeration.

We are in Michigan and the pond will freeze over in the winter.

I have read that you should shut off the deep aeration in the winter and run a shallower one to keep the ice open, which in turn helps with oxygen levels and may reduce fish die-offs.

My question starts for the following spring. The deep aeration has been shut-off and will need to be turned back on. Most recommend that you do it slowly, increasing in small increments each day. Our system is run by a windmill and we live an hour and a half away from the farm. I am not sure how to control a windmill aeration system as some suggest.

Are there other options to the restart?

I am far from an expert but I live in Northern Ohio and my family has many ponds.

The ponds that have windmill aeration my father and stepfather never did anything. They let it run as-is all winter long. As far as I am aware there was never any fish kills with this method. One pond was a bit bigger than 1 acre and about 25 ft deep. The other one is shallow 15 or less.

If you are concerned about it, you could hook up the hose for half a day, then unhook, gradually running longer and longer on windy days over a couple of weeks before leaving it hooked up.

Sadly my father is no longer around but my step father still is. I told him about how it's recommended to not aerate deep water in the winter and he was shocked by this as he hasn't had any troubles with the set-and-forget method, just grease in the spring.

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What I am doing in my pond is pump aeration in the shallow water right now in the winter to keep it open. I have a fountain that I put up for the winter, but it will be pumping deep water in the spring. I am told this isn't enough for my pond so I am looking into a Windmill option at some point.

I have had extremely good luck with Barley Straw in my Koi Ponds and will be using large bales in my big pond this spring. I want to get away from chemicals that build up if I can. I think it'll be better for the fish and other life.

I suppose moving it a little deeper once a week could do the trick.

If you fire up the deep diffuser when the water temp is in the upper 40's to low 50's you should be able to go 24/7 without going thru the "run 15 minutes day one, 30 min day 2, doubling the run time every day until running 24/7" start up procedure.