Pond Boss Forums AQUATIC VEGETATION Controlling unwanted plants Need Help With American Pondweed

My pond got American pondweed in it about 3-4 years ago and it is taking over really bad, What can I use to get rid of it and not hurt my fish, I am not intrested in removeing it with a lake rake , I want to use chemicles, also can you just spot treat it so it only kills it in certain areas or will it kill all of it off? I would not mind leaving some for my minnows but it needs to go on my beach and one shallow end where we fish.

Thanks

Check out this link discussing APW and the chemical mix that worked for the poster.

Ok so that guy used a chemical called reward, is their any other options. Is reward safe for my fish?

REWARD & NAUTIQUE are both contact (non-systemic) herbicides that will "burn" the contacted portions of susceptible plants. They will control American pondweed. But, repetative/short-interval treatments are usually required as the previously treated plants recover and attempt to generate new growth.
AQUATHOL K (liquid) will probably work better on the floating-leaf variety of the pondweed family. A 5% mixture applied as a LIGHT topical spray over the targeted areas (on a calm day) usually does a great job with only one treatment.
Virtually none of the aquatic-labeled herbicides represent a "direct threat" to fish - from a toxicity standpoint (Hydrothol is the only exception). However, ALL aquatic herbicides have the potential of causing "indirect" issues with fish through the secondary effect of reduced dissolved oxygen (DO); which is induced by the increased demand for oxygen from organisms that decompose the dead plant-biomass (aka "B.O.D."). There's no magical formula for determining how much plant-mass you can safely kill at one time without causing a DO-drop below the fish-sustaining threshold. There are too many variables involved (type & degree of weed infestation, pre-treat DO levels, water temp, whether natural or artificial aeration is present, etc). But, I'd say the possibility of causing a DO-crash through partial-pond treatments of Americal pondweed is fairly slim - unless several of the above factors are already against your favor.