Pond Boss Forums INTRO Questions & Observations Algae, Pondweed, and Chara taking over!

I had an algea problem this summer,early, and a man at Danbury Fish farm told me to put 1qt. cidekick and 1qt. hydrothol 191, and 1 gal. liquid cutirne + into a 25 gal. sprayer fill with water and spray the top of algea just enough to turn it the blue color. just enough to know that you have sprayed that area. It really worked for me and it wasn't a whole lot of chemical added to the lake. My lake was about 30-35 acres at that time, it's now about 40-45 acres and I haven't had any problem since then. however, after I got the algae problem under control, I began fertilizing to get a bloom. Seems to have worked.

I ended up scooping up as much floating alage as I could that had blow against the pier. The other night we has a heavy rain and it's gone gone gone. Anyone know what it is about the rain that does this?

I noticed using a sprinkler around the bluegill pond that overlapped onto the water also made the algae disappear. (Well water).

FA grows on the bottom, floats up when it has accumulated enough (O2) to become bouyant.

Rain knocks the O2 bubbles loose so it can sink. Several posters have commented that rain "breaks up the FA" - my guess on that is the drops falling are strong enough to break the filaments (which would help release the trapped gas bubbles).

Does this make sense?

Theo and I responded to this at the same time, but Theo was slightly faster on the Post Reply button.

Since filamentous algae always starts it's growth attached to underwater surfaces (usu the bottom), floating filamentous algae (FA) is not in it's prime growing site or at the best place for its growth. Usually when FA is at the surface it is in a declining or "death phase". A significiant amount of surface disruptions such as a thunder storm with hard rain or wave action breaks up and disrupts / disperses the algae mats and they sink. I think the mats are floating due to entraped air or gas bubbles among the dense mat. Beating the entraped air out of the mat causes it to sink.

Theo - the FA floats up when the hold fast cells of the algae filaments become deteriorated (usually low light affects) and the bouyancy force from entrapped gases is greater than the anchoring forces of the hold fast cells; thus it breakes lose or pulls lose and floats to the surface.

True guys but I see no sign of it on the bottom either and my pond has enough clarity to see to the bottom anywhere I look. All I see is chara. Maybe breaks up in tiny filaments and the is why it can't be seen?

Bill:

"Hold fasts" like with kelp?