Pond Boss Forums AERATION Should I aerate? Best aerator for quarter acre pond.

I'm leery of windmill only aeration, and here's why.

A client has 3 ponds on his land, all about the same size. All have the diffusers set up in the ponds identically, deep for summer, shallow for winter. One is aerated by electric compressor only, one by windmill and electric, the last one by windmill only. In February 2012 we had a 2 week period of heavy overcast days, fog, and no wind. There was about 6" of snow on the ice too. The windmill didn't turn enough to keep the water open, and it re-froze. Fast forward to the beginning of March or so. We saw an approximate 95% fish kill in the windmill only aerated pond, no dead fish in the other ponds.

Yeah I agree with Esshup here. You got to have a secondary way to move that windmill if need be! You just can't hope the wind is going to be there every day cause it will bite you in the you know what sooner or later.

RC

Yeah, I see what y'all are saying, but at least around here (NC) I've not seen it go for anywhere near that long with no wind. And, before I had the windmill there was no aeration at all, so it's getting more oxygen than it ever used to.

True, but the fish and other organisms in the pond will multiply to take advantage of the O2 that is now available, and utilise the whole water column (where they couldn't before). Then, after that happens, a period without wind will be even more time sensitive due to the extra lungs that are trying to breathe.

You can push air with an electric compressor a LONG ways - one property that I manage has air moving around 900' underground.