Pond Boss Forums AQUATIC VEGETATION Controlling unwanted plants cheated copper VS Cuso4

Kelly - thanks for opening the door. I was standing outside waiting.

weedsnomore -- many waters in WI have soft water (total hardness less than 50-100ppm). Low hardness and clearer water makes copper more likely to kill fish. The lower the hardness the easier fish die when exposed to copper. This is primarily because there are fewer things in the water (carbonates and silt/detritus) than can bind-up the copper thus it is more available and more potentent. Different fish species have different sensitivities to copper toxicity. Trout most sensitive, then minnows, then walleye,perch,catfish, then sunfishes, then bass are most tolerent.

Kelly gives very good acurate advice. Do contact Applied Biochemists. They may be familiar with your region and might be able to better estimate the relative total hardness of your water.

Copper sulfate is cheaper than Cutrine but if you own the pond and plan to keep it in the family, I would not use copper sulfate. It never goes away when in the sediments. Heavy metals are stable in the environment. The more copper that is in the sediments the more buildup and impact it has in the long term "health" of the sediments. Always use as little as possible of copper products. Your pond is not that big that removal of quite a bit of the algae is not that hard work or time consuming compared to a 1 to 3 acre pond.

Some algae species are more resistant than others to being killed by copper. It is best to know which kinds you have before "blindly" treating the "green" problem. Because if you treat and it does not kill or significently knock back the problem then the user almost always repeats the treatment using more chemical the next time. Double or triple doses should be unnecessary, not to mention wasteful and the multiple accumulative affects tend to be more harmful than a proper first dose.

I assume your algae problem is with the filamentous, stringy pond scum type of algae. I rarely see planktonic algae a long term problem. Planktonic algae usually comes and goes during the season. Most plankton algae results in better fish populations and an improved fish food chain.

Do at least two things to reduce the need for future uses of needing more and more chemical. 1. remove most of the growth first before treating

2. try and locate or figure out the source of nutrients that are feeding the algae problem; i.e. where are the nutriets coming from that are feeding it. Then reduce that nutrient source.

Alternative. Allowing some bottom weeds to grow competes with the algae and then algae grows less. I would rather deal with a bottom weed problem than an algae problem. We in Ohio can use grass carp but they may be illegal in WI.

If you read about the affects of copper in the citation that Kelly provided above, why would you want to put that stuff into a healthy fish pond.