I just put 20+ feet of rope through a hole I drilled in the handle of the Home Depot aluminum rake. I throw it out there quite a ways. It pulls in so much that by the time it's to shore I don't want it any heavier or I wouldn't be able to pull it out and lift it over my garden trailer to dump it off the rake.
Some stuff does break off and floats to the surface and actually "mats" together. I use a section of foam noodle zip tied to the rake to make if float for scooping up the top mats. I wait a day till it mats.
For some reason I don't have algae this year, but in the past years, I used a HD pool leaf skimmer scoop net on it's telescoping pole. It worked really well. In just a few seconds you could fill the scoop with algae and pull it in. Dumping it over my garden trailer took 1 second. Very quick to use. Again, if it was any bigger it would be difficult to use because it would be too heavy.
