Pond Boss Forums GENERAL QUESTIONS Product sources Muck Reducer / Good Bacteria

So with trying to cleanup a 100 year old small pond 1/4-1/3 acre does anyone suggest using any of the muck reducer products or adding any good bacteria in the pond?

Planning on taking in some water samples to have tested but trying to forward think this project.
just installed aeration.

Thanks

I've tried bacterial products designed for home aquariums and been underwhelmed by their performance. Been told the products for septic tanks are also of dubious effectiveness.

Good (long) thread about this topic here.

That is a good link by, Dr Luke. I agree with many of the posters, aeration is probably the best muck reducer. I previously owned an old cow pond that was literally quicksand. I spent an entire summer just pumping air and water into the muck and stirring it up like a dirty martini.

By fall I had cut the muck in half and had a backhoe dig out around the edge of the pond. The next summer I repeated the process and by fall, the pond was unrecognizable from what I started with.

As the Bob Marley song goes, Stir it up....

I just started pumping surface water down into the muck all the way to the hard bottom. I then let it set for a day or two then dredge it out with a 3" trash pump it softens the lower layer of muck and makes it easier to suck up.

thanks for the thread link and the stir/pump ideas. We used a backhoe on it about 12 years ago but didn't want to press our luck creating a leak. Reached out as far as we could and took a bucket depth all the way around.

about killed myself hand digging/burying the air cable down the hill to the diffusers. extension cords from the cgfi at the house until I can run the power 200ft to the pole. almost done with that phase.

I started with 2-9" diffusers until I can see if I need a third because of my sallow depth. Bob and a guest on one of his shows suggested the air may not spread and drop like with deeper ponds (hence 3) so I'm keeping that in mind.

All in all it's a nice little pond already. perch hybrid, catfish, turtles, frogs and ducks. I have Bermuda almost all the way around now.

more concerned about not impacting the health of the pond trying to improve it.