BOD is an actual standardized laboratory test to determine the relative oxygen requirements of wastewaters, effluents and polluted waters. The test is designed to measure the waste loadings to treatment plants and the efficiency of treatment systems. The primary oxygen consumer in the BOD test is bacterial action. The BOD laboratory test generally has little value in measuring the actual oxygen demand of surface waters and the lab results not a true representation of water body conditions since the laboratory conditions do not reproduce the actual or the real world conditions of temperature, sunlight, all biological populations in all habitats, water movement, and oxygen concentrations.
We on the PB Forum use BOD as Theo described, although it is probably not truly measureable due to the complexity of all things consuming oxygen in a pond habitat. Generally the more productive an aquatic habitat becomes the more life forms that are present to consume dissolved oxygen during the dark period.
Last edited by Bill Cody; 05/30/09 05:33 PM.
