Help with FA! - 04/10/13 11:39 PM
We've owned our 1 acre pond for a little more than 6 months now. It's a very old mill pond and wasn't touched for 2 years before we bought the property. The algae was pretty bad when we moved in and the storm associated with hurricane Sandy washed most of it away last fall, but more than 50% of the surface was again covered by algae mats by late fall. In February, I started treating The pond with VitaStim Polar and installed an aeration system consisting of 2 9" diffusers spaced apart and driven by an Ecoplus 7 pump. The system "boils" pretty well, and we have worked our way up to 12 hours (6pm to 6am) per day of aeration. The pond is shallow, only 4-5 ft with lots of muck on the bottom. Well, at the rate it's growing, it will soon be 90% covered. I tried raking off about 10% of the surface Monday night and by Tuesday night it had filled in what I had removed. I have bales of barley straw to put in, but don't feel like putting this "preventative" tool to use until I get the huge amount of FA under some level of control. I was hoping to avoid copper, but should I start hitting patches of it with Cutrine Plus at this point? Water temp has hit the 60's this week. I'm just about at a loss and am hoping you folks can help me out. I have looked at archives and old posts, and it looks as if talapia would be a good solution, but they are illegal here in PA. Please help!