Pond Boss Forums MANAGING AN EXISTING POND Fertilization Bacteria for Pond debris (leaves)

Can Rid-X be used to digest the leaves at the bottom of my pond or do I need to pay an outrageous price for digestive bacteria ?

Septic additions are basic bacterial decomposers of common organic materials. Try a couple brands combined together as dosages for a year and keep notes as to how well they work Roebic, OneFlush). One can always add small amounts (2-3 oz) of some 'standard' pond digestive bacteria with each dosage to 'enhance' the septic brands. Most all digestive bacteria work best with bottom aeration that keeps oxygenated water on the sediment water interface. Rapidly decomposing types of bacteria all need oxygenated conditions to thrive & work.

Good info Bill. I have always assumed that the septic additives were for anaerobic conditions.

""I have always assumed that the septic additives were for anaerobic conditions."" Incorrrect assumption although some brands include some anaerobic strains.

FWIW, in talking with some of the bacteria mfg's., they say the bacteria has a shelf life of 2 years when kept in cool dry conditions.

Thanks Bill,
I have aeration on the bottom now so I will try a couple different brands together. Merry Christmas.
Steve Malafy

You have to give it time to see noticeable progress. IMO agitating the bottom with a lake rake or similar tool prior to adding the bacteria helps redistribute the sediments, infuses oxygenated water into the bottom sediments and allows better decompositon. Regularly agitating the worst offending sediment areas speeds decomposition. More bang for the buck: Try adding a few ounces of bacteria blends to some roiled pond water(bacteria food) let it culture to grow many times more bacteria in the bucket for several hours. Then distribute it to areas of the pond. Remember agitated bottom areas will see the best benefits.

Rid-X has darn little bacteria, and a whole lot of filler in a box

Rid X is nothing more then a marketing ploy. Your septic system already naturally has plenty of enzymes and natural bacteria like yeast to function properly. A Little box of corn meal and cellulase (yeast) is going to do nothing at all. A few packets of Brewers yeast will do the same thing. That or just "seed the tank regularly" aka poop in the toilet. I don't see where it would have any benefit in a pond. Even in septic tanks arreation is the best method to help natural bacteria to work. Yet, no matter what at some point it will need cleaned out. I don't know much about ponds but know a lot about septic tanks and sewage lagoons. http://www.rbnainfo.com/MSDS/US/Rid-X-Septic-Treatment-US-English.pdf

Large annual amounts of tree leaves are a pond's worst natural enemy and very difficult to adequately & timely process.Some leaf packs become buried by more leaves and it take many years for the buried now anaerobic leaves to recycle back to basic nutrients. This topic is worthy of an entire in-depth article.

There is quite a bit of discussion in past threads about adding different types of bacteria to ponds for improved decomposition of organic materials. Some of the threads are below. Some like it, some consider it a waste of money. I get numerous mixed opinions when people who I advise try the bacterial additions. The main problem as I see it is, there are very few if any good scientific based studies on the topic - mostly just opinions and sales promotions. As I mentioned earlier proper application and aeration helps a lot to improve all bacterial decomposition. IMO bacteria additions are best used when the water quality and bacterial community of the pond habitat has be compromised by treatments, sometimes overused, herbicide and algae treatments. Bacterial additions can often help the pond recover.

Septic systems do receive frequent inoculations of bacteria and enzymes. However most septic systems are primarily anaerobic and very inadequate of the necessary dissolved oxygen and features for the bacteria to survive-function. Thus many of the commercial septic bacteria brands fail in the home septic anaerobic environment. Sewage treatment plants, who often utilize bacterial - microbial additions, are designed for strong agitation, mixing and adequate oxygenation of the waste soup; thus they see benefits of bacterial additions.

I think the in-house tested and produced products by Aquafix (Madison WI) are some of the better microbe additions available.

Others may be willing to help with opinions and PB Forum links.
Bacteria Discussions
http://forums.pondboss.com/ubbthreads.php?ubb=showflat&Number=290502
Thread in 2006 with Lusk’s opinion. Some opinions may have changed since then.
http://forums.pondboss.com/ubbthreads.ph...0&site_id=1
2010 discussion
http://forums.pondboss.com/ubbthreads.php?ubb=showflat&Number=217184
2012 Discussion
http://forums.pondboss.com/ubbthreads.php?ubb=showflat&Number=290502

More threads on this topic can be found by searching the forum. I don’t have time right now to do the searching. The guru expert 'Bugman' at Aquafix has agreed to provide comment in this thread.

Here's my two cents on bacteria and my observations. First off anaerobic bacteria obviously cannot keep up with the amount of debris entering some ponds, that why there is a build up in the first place. I do believe aerobic bacteria can digest much faster and reduce sediment. Think of a wood post in the ground such as a fence post which has been there for years. When the post breaks off where does it break? Always right at the ground level. Why, because the exposed post is dry most of the time, and the bottom has moisture most of the time. But if it were just water breaking it down then the bottom of the post would decay first as it is in the wettest environment. If you dig out the post bottom you will find it is in good shape yet. What has happened is right at ground level you have both moisture and oxygen and the post rots fastest there. Also note that nobody added beneficial bacteria to the post, it was already there. It may be possible that some ponds do not have the beneficial bacteria so adding it once may help. I view that as in the "it can't hurt" category. I view my pond like the fence post where the moisture starts (ponds surface) there is oxygen as you go deeper you may not have as much or any at all.

Here is what I observed when digging out a wetland area to make a pond. The pond became stagnant because there was no oxygen getting down to the bottom and muck was quickly building up on top of muck that was already there. No surprise there at all, but as we all know a pond is an ongoing adventure. I was looking at the material that had been removed when making the pond a year later when the light came on. There was clay, which looked like it did the day it came out. There was peat moss which was slowly breaking down. Then there were areas where depressions had formed in the pile and only gravel remained. As I pondered the fact that I did not remember seeing much gravel and that what was there originally was muck that was a lot like jelly. I realized it had broken down completely when it got exposed to the air.

I then added aeration to the pond thinking that maybe the same thing would happen. I saw a quick change in the water quality as you may have guessed. As any good pond boss would do I smiled and said "I'm adding some more aeration".

So two years later I was out on the pond checking things out. I put a ten foot pole in the water and looked for the bottom. I was shocked to feel a hard gravel bottom where there was feet of muck before. The pond was not feet deeper but maybe a little deeper. I then pushed the pole down as hard as I could and was able to push through that layer into feet of soft muck below it. I repeated this several times. So what had happened? Where the oxygen reached the muck it had indeed allowed the bacteria to break down the muck but below that was still an anaerobic condition.

My thinking now is that if I disturb the bottom it would become deeper because more muck is exposed to the oxygen and breaks down. I have good sized area that is all the same depth with the same gravel surface area over the muck. I'm going to try disturbing the pond bottom in part of it several times a month during the summer and see if it gets deeper. I will take detailed measurements to be sure of my results.

I'm convinced oxygen is the key, and that these bacteria are already in my pond. Every pond is different and so what works for one may be completely wrong for another.

Woodster, how do you propose to disturb the bottom? I agree, if we had some way to agitate the bottom sediments effectively we would give the bacteria a better chance. I have wondered about using a jet ski jet, a motor boat if we could direct the prop wash straight down etc. In deeper ponds how do you agitate the bottom? You would need a powerful post hole digger mounted on a barge that augers up and down at various places lifting and disturbing the sediments? But then do you introduce possibility for leaks? How do you do that with a properly compacted pond bottom? Some type of bottom crawling paddle wheel spinning contraption?

The general successful trend in decomposing bottom muck is keeping or infusing oxygen into the offending zone. The problem with aeration is it moves water over top the sediments and does not mix or infuse oxygen down into the sediments. Oxygenating or regular mixing at the mud water interface results in rapid decay of the top sediment / muck layer. Now all we have to do is figure out a way to practically mix or till the pond bottom muck - sediment. Common carp, koi, gizzard shad or other bottom activity will cause natural sediment mixing but their constant activity almost always results in too much muddy turbid water that deters the sport fishery by inhibiting the plankton populations.
See May-June 2016 Pond Boss Mag for: POND ENVIRONMENT: FOOD REQUIREMENTS AND DIRTY WATER. West reviews current research about protein (amino acid taurine) needs of pond fish and how suspended sediment significantly impacts pond fish and a majority of the ecosystem.
Advanced Readings
Photosynthesis Production. From http://www.fondriest.com/environmen...ty-total-suspended-solids-water-clarity/
Turbidity can also inhibit photosynthesis by blocking sunlight. Halted or reduced photosynthesis means a decrease in plant survival and decreased dissolved oxygen output. The higher the turbidity levels, the less light that can reach the lower levels of water. This reduces plant productivity at the bottom of an ocean, lake or river. Without the needed sunlight, seaweed and bay grasses below the water�s surface will not be able to continue photosynthesis and may die.
Underwater vegetation die-off has two main effects. First, as photosynthetic processes decrease, less dissolved oxygen is produced, thus further reducing DO levels in a body of water. The subsequent decomposition of the organic material can drop dissolved oxygen levels even lower. Second, seaweed and underwater plants are necessary food sources for many aquatic organisms. As they die off, the amount of vegetation available for other aquatic life to feed on is reduced. This can cause population declines up the food chain

https://www.fws.gov/northeast/virgi...cumseh/EffectsofSediment_Henley_2000.pdf

http://link.springer.com/chapter/10.1007%2F978-1-4757-1674-0_15https://www.jstor.org/stable/1940593?seq=1#page_scan_tab_contents

http://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.2307/1937582/full

Canyon creek those are good points you bring up. In my case the pond bottom is below the water table so I don't need to worry about causing a leak. The area where I will be testing ranges 6 or 7 feet deep and the bottom is very soft once you get down about 4 inches under the current pond bottom. My plan is to drag a heavy anchor along the bottom. I can drop the anchor from my boat and then pull it from shore with a long rope and my tractor. Then take the anchor back out there in the boat and drop it again. Essentially I'm going to plow the pond bottom in a test area to see what happens. It may be possible to drag the anchor from a boat also. You wouldn't dare do this to a compacted pond bottom.

Your idea of using the prop wash to disturb the bottom is interesting. Think of public boat launches, even in muck bottom lakes the launches are usually muck free from the disturbance. How much of the clearing is bacterial and how much is simply mechanical is the question. Windy, wavy shores don't have muck build up but secluded bays do, same question. But what we know for sure is that the waves coming ashore have a much higher concentration of dissolved oxygen than the bays do.

Wave splashed or thrashed shorelines are always clean which I attribute to the frequent oxygenation and agitation of those shoreline bottom zones.

Instead of a boat anchor that is drug or pulled by your tractor consider using a bigger piece of homemade tiller such as bed springs, a chain link pipe frame gate, a small field drag, a delta harrow, small section of a spring tooth drag, a spring tooth harrow, or a homemade, square-rectangular weighted stove bolt drag made of 2"PVC about 4ftx4ft with 4" to 8" bolts spaced 2"-4" apart on the back side opposite the pull line or drawbar.

http://ourtinyfarmnc.blogspot.com/2011/12/build-your-own-drag-chain-harrow-manure.html

This will move a lot of debris in short order. We use this to keep ice off for late season duck hunts. Pushing the water parallel to the bottom will stir things up in a hurry, I would think.

I wouldn't think you'd need to run it long in any one area, and keep moving it around.

http://mallardviewoutdoors.com/product-category/ice-eaters/