JD, is that some blue dye in your pond? Can you share make/model of the dye and roughly how much it takes to achieve that shade of blue? It looks nice!
If others have advise on this that would be great.
I just used plain aquashade. I tried an off-brand and never had good luck with it. This year I poured about 3/4 of a gallon directly onto the ice in a big patch. As the ice melted it flowed into the water. I'm pretty happy with the color.
I'm hoping with the aeration I can get away from using the coloring, but I knew I wouldn't get the aerator in right at ice melt, and I wanted to stop the early algae bloom that happened last year...or at least reduce it.
The aquashade has another benefit for us. We drink the water in the pond. It gets filtered through multiple filters and uses chlorine bleach as part of the process. When the system is working well, the water is nice and clear. But with good amount of aquashade in the pond, the water in the showers and toilets becomes a noticeable blue when the chlorine system isn't working correctly. A month ago our water started turning blue and I checked the Stenner peristaltic pump and found the tube to be worn and the chlorine levels low. It's a nice early warning sign. Once the aerator is working well, I may go back to the off-brand blue dye just for the chlorine check and looks.
There is a noticeable difference in the thickness and concentration of the blue dye in aquashade versus the off-brand. But the aquashade was noticeably more money.
Hope this helps.
EDIT: I'll add that the System 1 pond also has aquashade in it, but isn't nearly the same color. I'm not sure why mine takes that particular shade of blue...it is pretty though!
