Pond Boss Forums AQUATIC VEGETATION Controlling unwanted plants minnow seine for FA on pond

Been reading PB forums for over a year and subscribed to my second year of PB mag. A great mag and web site! Question--I have FA on my pond. Not to bad but enough to start being concerned about. Can I or has anyone used a minnow seine to scoop out these mats ? Thought I'd wait till the wind blew the stuff to one location and my wife and I could seine alot of it out. Haven't bought the seine yet, but it gives me an accuse to get one for seining minnows later. Any thoughts ? Thanks Bob

Welcome to the forum Broken String! Glad you finally posted...

I think it could be done, but you're gonna get a back work out. Depending on how big the seine is, if it's full of FA it's gonna weigh a ton. From having run seines through vegetated areas and pulled in a seine full of fish and vegetation, they weigh a lot! If you're goal is to seine out FA, keep the seine on the smaller size to make sure you done get so much FA that you cannot even pull the net in it weighs so much. Also, make sure the poles you use on your seine are heavy duty. Even wood broom handles which I usually use may not stand up to that kind of stress...

One last note... Check with the laws in Michigan. Each state has specific laws on the size seine that is allowed. Some only relate to public waters, while others concern both. For example, Virginia only allows a seine that is 4'x12' in public waters, but any size for private. While Pennsylvania only allows a seine size of 4'x4' in both public and private waters unless you obtain a very expensive permit for a bigger seine.

If you have a smaller pond and don't mind the time and work, couldn't you use a pool skim net to pull it out? I suppose it depends on how much you're talking about.

An option for seining is to drop the seine so it only collects part of the FA at one time. Gradually work out the entire mat in smaller portions or amounts. Easy does it and not all at once. A seine works pretty good to remove floating FA. A picture of your experience would be good to have on the forum.

Thanks everyone for the advice. I will seine out small parts of the mat till I remove most of it. I'll try to put pics of this project in the forum when my wife & I do this hopefully in the next week or so.

I'd rake it. You can choose how much you want to get out at one time. The big landscaping hard tine rakes work great. My big concern with a seine is how do you get the fa out of it? This is the number one call in my business, especially this time of year. And unless that mesh is extremely fine, it will get all stuck in that net, and will probably be more work getting it out of net than the pond. Second is you might overload the net with weight, and that won't take much. Stuff is solid water, like a full sponge. My third concern would be you just ruin the net. Have not seen a photo so can't say for sure, but I have to voice my concerns here.

Thanks Pond Frog. You brought up some good questions. I do have a hard rake. Maybe I'll give it a try tomorrow after it stops raining.

My experience is sometimes a rake works, sometimes it does not; IMO it mostly depends on the species of FA. Rakes works best (if one considers it best) with coarse stranded FA as the bad guy. Fine stranded FA such as Mougeotia or Oedogonium doesn't rake out well at all. FA esp fine stuff still attached to the bottom does not rake out well either. FA often gets hung up & tangled on the rake and it is hard to shake off. I find the best tool for quickly and efficiently removing floating FA is a smelt dipping net. With fine nylon mesh (3/16-1/4") no algae sticks in the net, long handle allows reaching fairly far (9'-12') into the pond to drag / scoop in and lift out a good amount of algae with each dip. All algae quickly and cleanly drains out the water and then plops out of the inverted net into a cart or on the ground in piles.

Several places sell smelt nets. Cabela's had (may have) them still. I think Aquatic Ecosystems has similar nets (not sure of handle length). I like the nets with extendable handles from 6'to 12'. We had some smelt nets specially built with double wall tubing at the attachment point to reduce breaking / bending of the rim/hoop. They are also very good for removing floating leaves, weeds or other organic trash.

I removed the regular mesh net from a couple smelt nets and replaced the bag with a similar sized homemade bag sewn together from mosquito netting. Really great for removing floating fine or small organic stuff and catching grass shrimp, fish fry and invertebrates.

Thanks Bill. Sounds like my wife is going to be real busy.

Everyone that buys a net seems to really like them. When they overload the net and the rim bends and breakes, users regularly come back for another net.

I have 2 algae jobs scheduled Sunday, two on Wednesday. I use a wide head hard tine rake first. If you don't twist it, it falls right off. If the rake does not work, and it is too fine I use a pool skimmer. For lined ponds I use a toilet brush on smalls, a pool brush on large. I have never broke the rake, and the one I use is 5 years old. I guess if I sold nets that broke and people came back for another I'd say they work great too. I have over 10 different nets. I use them for fish, and polliwogs. Maybe I need a instructional rake video.

FA is ok in any pond , its helps with micro bugs the small fish eat. It's really early to worry about. When it's starts getting bad , if it does. You can't control your nuite. flow. Only and only on a small pond. Hydrated lime will kill it on the spot. Never use alot at one time , unless you monitor the PH. Do little spots at a time. Cool thing about HDL in stays put. You can stir the bank with a paddle latter if the FA statrs up.

That is pretty much my mantra. It is supposed to be there in some extent. Just a normal part of the ecosystem and usually seasonal. In my ponds I am in total management control, I look at it.

However people freak out, think it is some kind of plague, caries H1N1 and West Nile. Plus it's sooo ugly. Pretty hard to convince people to like something they think is the devil's green spawn. In small ponds and fountains, it can be a problem fast.

Doesn't help either when people scare little children by wearing it out of the water. Swamp thing...

With Adrienne Barbeau the Swamp Thing was just a sideshow. Picked up new customer that has a slight fa issue. And they want it out. So I give the people what they want. They even had some Algaecide copper and Aquashade there for me. I did say no to the algaecide, just sinks the stuff and perpetuated the problem. They even had a rake. I'll bring my own rake, and some pool tools, a net and skimmer. Spray and squirt some dye. Looks to be loaded with fish, and they said, fish all you want. I love my job.

My older sis brought her 2 granddaughters to fish last year for the 1st time. I kept apologizing for the unsightly mats, not bad, but, you never know how people will feel. My sis says, 'Burger, it's a POND.'

If ever I had those mats floating around , heads would roll.

Stoney Creek sells seines that are only about 2 feet deep.
they work well in conjunction with a dip net with an extended handle and fine mesh.

It's all in taking control when it becomes to much.