Guys this is some pretty good input, and I thank you for that. I think good common sense is always the best practice. Many variables come into play, and each pond we deal with is different in its own right I suppose. I can imagine that if copper sulphate lowers and /or removes oxygen levels and thus in turn ultimately kills algae, caution certainly should be used. I'd imagine a hot summer day with O2 levels suffering and depleted would not be good to pour a bunch of that into the pond. I have used some if it, basically a few cupfulls at a time sparingly around the edges and tried to find the happy medium. Anything that the blue fine granules touched, turned brown and died off. If I did not rake it out, that dead algae would just turn into muck and end up in the bottom of the pond. So in reality, I think the best is just to rake it out as needed. And maybe do some small spot treatments using the copper sulphate. Steep sides to the pond definitely help I think. In using the copper sulphate in limited doses, I cannot say that it has harmed the fish, however it may create some long term problems I suppose based on the above comments. My property I dug the pond on used to be a horse pasture. I think there is lots of "nutrients" around. Ill talk with Nate regarding this, I may have him do some water tests with me, and we are planning a electro shock just to investigate the fish. It's a work in progress and is a lot if fun for me to be able to do this and discuss with fellow pond guys. And I do have a feeder I feed aqua max 50% protein grower and mix that with smaller pan fish pellets. I figure this way the bass get the larger pellets and the bluegil eat the smaller pellets. ( which they do) a key to a successful bass pond is to concentrate maybe not so much on the bass... But rather their forage. And harvest smaller bass less than 10-12 inches of course!
