Pond Boss Forums AERATION Should I aerate? water quality

I have a .10 acre pond, mostly 6 ft deep sloping at one end to a beach area, gravel bottom over vinyl sheeting. It is primarily a family swimming area, though has fatheads and tadpoles for the girls to play with. Originally had crystal clear water, has turned greenish and have some brownish algae on rocks along the shore. I just started aerating last week( bottom diffuser, and it seems a little better so far. I had been adding chlorine tablets weekly to help keep water clean from harmful bacteria ( 6-10 3" tablets per week). I was told on this forum to NOT add chlorine. Is this to protect the aquatic life, or is it contributing to the lack of water clarity.
The pond is in central Texas, avg 95-100 degree weather in the summer.
Thanks

Well, I'll take a guess on this one. From reading the recent thread that I included a link to below, using chlorine will kill of a lot of the beneficial bacteria that a pond needs. If you harm these it may create poor quality water.

http://forums.pondboss.com/ubbthreads.ph...true#Post347789

Try this one - the librarian.


http://forums.pondboss.com/ubbthreads.ph...true#Post150171

Or even better

http://forums.pondboss.com/ubbthreads.ph...true#Post149970

A tidbit of info.

Here are example chlorine levels and what they can do to pond fish:

.006 mg/L will kill fish fry in about two days.
.003 mg/L will kill insect larvae, such as dragonflies.
.002 mg/L will fatally damage the sensitive skin on tadpoles, frogs, salamanders and other amphibians.
.01 mg/L is the maximum level that experts say adult fish can tolerate.
.25 mg/L is the level at which only the hardiest koi or other pond fish can survive.
.37 mg/L is the level at which all pond fish will die.

The chlorine will also kill decomposting bacteria that are responsible for decaying all forms of dead organic matter from very tiny to larger forms such as leaves and manure from all resident animals. All swimming pools will quickly turn green without constant chlorination. Without decomposition you will have lots of problems with this pond. Trying to maintain a pond as a pool has lots of challenges. It takes a very good biological balance to maintain clear water continually. It is as much art as science.

So I have aeration going, supposedly enough for a pond twice this size. I get now that the chlorine could prevent bacteria that can help keep the water clear. So should I try algaecide(non-copper) and adding the beneficial bacteria I see for sale, and then if it doesn't clear up, try a flocculent? Thanks for any advice

When you say the water is cloudy, if you were to take a white coffee cup, put it on a string and drop it in the water, how far would it go before you couldn't see it anymore?

Get a mason jar or other clear (glass) jar. Fill it with water from the pond and set it on a shelf. Don't move it, but keep an eye on it. See how much settles out of the water in a few days. If nothing or very little, then maybe alum would help, but only if it's suspended solids and not phytoplankton.

Read this:

https://srac.tamu.edu/index.cfm/event/getFactSheet/whichfactsheet/108/

and do the bucket test before you try the procedure on the whole pond.

If the turbidity is NOT due to clay, then it's nutrients in the water.

If you want clear water like a swimming pool, you have to have a lot of plants in it to utilize the nutrients in the pond. If not, then algae will grow to utilize the nutrients. Algae as in Phytoplankton and possibly filamentous algae. You may have clear water for a bit, but it's like trying to balance on a knife edge. Any little push one way or the other will tip the balalnce and turbidity will increase.

If I keep the jar in a room that is dark most of the time, would this get rid of phytoplankton as a possible culprit in my testing?

Probably. Just set it on the in a normally daylight area.

Would bio boost phosphate cleanser help, both with algae blooms and removing suspended solids?

O.K., lets take a step back here. Before you throw a bunch of $$ into the pond water trying to clear it up, you have to know what you are dealing with. Sort of like having a runny nose and taking aspirin for it. Without knowing exactly what is causing the condition that you don't like about the pond water, you can't effectively treat it.

Have you had a comprehensive water test done to the pond water?

What water clarity are you looking for? If you are looking for swimming pool like water clarity, without plants in the pond, without a large filtration system, or without a pump and a wetland area to circulate the water thru, it flat out ain't going to happen.

Here's some reading for you:

Natural swimming pool pond Mother Earth News

Natural Pools

Esshup - That is good information about natural earth bottom swimming ponds-pools. Thanks. It might be good to put this in Common Q-A Archives?

Thanks for the links, a lot to digest but very appealing. I did the coffe cup test, and could see almost 4 feet with the white cup. Main problem is brown algae on the rocks, and loating clumps of some kind of algae scum stuff, which seems to sink at night and rise in the heat of the day. The plant areas seem like a good option, but gonna take a lot of time and planning due to the shape I built the pond. I may try an algaecide treatment for now, and work on the plant filtering areas over the winter and start anew next spring.
Where can I go to get the comprehensive water testing?

Bill, if you think it's worthy of the archives, go for it!

thrdez, you may be familiar with this place for your water testing.....

http://soiltesting.tamu.edu/files/waterweb1.pdf