Pond Boss Forums GENERAL QUESTIONS Water chemistry PH tester

I just checked the PH and alkilinity on a couple of my ponds. One is black and looks like tannin water but no oaks were flooded. I suspect flooded grasses. I checked the PH but only had a swimming pool test strip kit. It showed less than the guage on the side of the package tested. Don't know if this is accurate or not. I checked alkilinity with my HACH kit and it took 9 drops of acid to turn the right color. That's an alkilinity level of 153. No fish activity but no shortage of tadpoles.

Next I went to my bigger, normal pond. PH showed, with the same strips, to be 6.8 and the alkilinity also 153 with the HACH. Lots of fish and good looking water.

I've always heard that swimming pool test strips were inaccurate on alkilinity but how about PH?
Should I buy a special PH test kit? If so, what kind? Is there anything I ought to know that I'm not asking? Anybody run into blackened water from flooded grasses?

Yes I have seen the same occerence here in Ohio. I have a pond that the spillway corroded & drained the pond 4-5 yr. ago. I recntly repaired the spillway & refilled the pond. There were grasses & weeds that had grown up on the banks fron the low water levels from the last few years. When I got it back up to the level I wanted all the grasses & weeds were underwater. Within 3wks the water that had always been a greenish color turned nearly total black.

Dan, I waited about 6 months until the water had lightened up somewhat and sent a sample off to Texas A & M for testing. The pond I was dealing with was less than 1/4 acre. I was told it was OK so I tossed in 100 bluegills and about 25 channel cat. Within a year, I was having to seine the bluegills to add to larger ponds. Take a sample using a new baby bottle. I assume somebody in your neck of the woods does testing.

Dave- my pond still had fish in it even after losing the spillway. It still held 4-5 ft. of water so the fish made it thru all that. Fact is way to many made it. I have BG & LMG that are stunted, no LMB over 3lbs & very few big gills.I didnt find any dead fish after refilling the pond, just the big change in water color & clarity. I still have 1 Koi thats huge & a grass Carp that must be 20lb.I first stocked the pond in 1985.Still have a shovelhead cat thats over 10lb for I watched a 11yr old neighbor boy catch it on a doughball right after the spillway was fixed.That was exciting for me just to watch that little boy battle that big cat.

Does anyone know if the ODNR will test my pond water or maybe the local county health dept.?? I am very new to testing the water & I just keep getting more & more confused so I need someone who knows what their doing & dont know whom to contact here in N.E, Ohio

Dan, I went to the Dept. of Health to have my well water tested for bacteria and other nasties. I sent my pond water to Texas A & M for analysis and had to get help interpreting the results. They have different specialties. I expect the NRCS or County Agent could give you some guidance.

Swimming pool test kits work in theory for pH but in reality the high organic load of a typical pond cause interferences which lead to errors. I have been testing my pond for pH, hardness, alkalinity, CO2, O2, Nitrate and phosphate (ortho) and running the tests using 2 methods. I've been running the samples by Standard Methods (the EPA approved methodology) in the lab I retired from but since I won't always have that option, I've been running duplicate analyses with Aquarium drop count test kits and having good reproducable results. Aquarium test kits are cheaper than Hach test kits per test and have produced results which I am confident with. Be careful to select test kits for fresh water not salt, some of the kits are not stocked in alot of pet shops so you may have to shop around.

Thanks for the info guys & I think I may give the local health dept. a call & see if they will do it.
Anyone here ever used one of those little electonic testers with the digital readouts. Do you work very well? I dont think they test for very many things. I dont think they can test for bacteria at all.

Dan, I'm a lot more comfortable dealing with the Health Dep't than I am doing my own tests for bacteria. As I recall, they were pretty inexpensive and I'm enamored with the idea of being able to sleep nights.

I have a Hach kit that I'm not wild about. It involves addition of a chemical agent(?) to determine color change for alkilinity. Just how pink is pink? What shade am I really looking for? I am of the opinion that alkilinity doesn't really change that much since it is dependent on soil. The qualification is that my area is not alkilinity challenged. Pine tree country is a another matter and takes continous monitoring and periodic doctoring. Lab analysis confirms that a swimming pool test kit pretty well approximates my actual pH.

I have, on several occasions, almost purchased a DO meter. However, they are expensive and I figure that this would only tell me what I know in an after the fact manner. I figure aeration is a good tool to prevent a DO crash instead of a meter that tells me I've had one. Dead fish seem to be a good meter and by that time, it's too late and I wish I had aerated. The disclaimer is that I generally learn things the hard way. My DO crashes have been Mother Natures way of telling me that I have pushed the limit too far without taking proper precautions.

well I am pretty sure all my Alkilinty problems are coming from the fact that all my springs from underground run thru layers of limestone. They mine limestone in my area after they get the top layers of coal.There are no pines at all anywhere within 1/4 mile of my pond.This is also making my hardness come out very high at 300ppm which I have always heard is the #1 cause of hardness at least here where I live.I had been testing the springs only for the pond is & has been frozen over for the last few weeks. Just yesterday it got warm enough that the pond was clear of all ice & I did several tests & they came out very good from what I could tell. The PH & Alkilinity were right where I wanted them. 7.0 on PH. I guess the acid in the rain sure brings down the PH when the spring water hits the pond. I did several tests at different locations in the pond & they all came out the same.How harmful is the high hardness reading to the health of the pond.Thats the only high reading I get on the 5 things I test for now in the pond. Still am going to contact the Health Dept for bacteria tests that I cant do.

Which test kit should a beginner start with to have accurate tests? I would appreciate the name and model as well as where it may be purchased. I realize some of the kits are very expensive so this is the reason I would appreciate feedd back so I do not go in the wrong direction. thanks
I have a titrets total alkalinity tester that I have not been able to get to test properly. It has a range of 10 - 100 ppm .

Hello again..

Sorry for all the questions. I really could talk all day about the pond.

I am getting my water and mud tested, but since I was thinking about it I went out and bought a cheap PH test kit, for pools. I did a test in 2 spots and came up with a color that indicates very close to 6.8 maybe slightly less but no less then 6.5. What do you think of this reading and the accuracy of this type of test. Assuming its close to being right, am I in the ball park for PH or could it be better? If it could be better what is considerd perfect for the pond? Thanks again.

In almost all ponds pH is very rarely a problem. I typicaly do not worry about pH unless the pond is unusually clear (vis 10-20ft) in very poor acidic soils and or with high humic or leaf content to produce heavy brown water stain which MAY & only may indicate low pH. It is extremly rare in my experiences to see a pond with low water transparancy (vis 2-3ft) and low pH. Turbid pond water (vis 2-3ft) almost always tests adequate pH.

A much more important character or perameter to measure is akalinity if you are interested in having a pond with good natural producivity which means a large food chain base, thus more natural fish production. Do a search for alkalinity test or alkalinity test kit. There has been some good discussion about what type of simple test kit will provide fairly good results. Also search for- Papond -he is a retired chemist and has posted about simple test kits. Alkalinity needs to be close to or above 50 to get good plankton blooms. Low pH can indicate or point to a tendency toward low alkalinity. But you will not know this as FACT UNLESS you mesure the alkalinity; so you might as well measure alkalinity as the 1st test. pH can vary much more during a 24 hr period than alkalinity which tends to be relatively or pretty stable over the seasons.

Try these topics.

http://www.pondboss.com/ubb/ultimatebb.php?ubb=get_topic;f=17;t=000049#000000

http://www.pondboss.com/ubb/ultimatebb.php?ubb=get_topic;f=17;t=000049#000000

http://www.pondboss.com/ubb/ultimatebb.php?ubb=get_topic;f=17;t=000068#000008

http://www.pondboss.com/ubb/ultimatebb.php?ubb=get_topic;f=17;t=000012#000003

Ok thanks I will read these posts and will look to get a Lamontt kit. I was thinking PH and alkilinity was the same or moved the same. I am gathering lots of STUFF for this pond and I only had it 8 months. I can imagine the STUFF you guys all have..

Many pondowners only have a fish pole. A few others have a pole and fish pellets. It does not take a lot of gadgets to raise good healthy fish.

A fishing pole... I am in a little deeper then that. I am not complaining at all though. Started with some fish, then fish pellets, contactors, nets, scales, log books, golden ruler, lime, test kits, contractors, shovels, chain saw, cinderblocks, docks, paint, seed, more fish, areators, lines, electric, fertilizer, gravel, equipment to cut the pond banks, a 22 rifel for pond critters, hehehe oh ya PB magazine... OK thats enough. hahaha

Joey, nice start.

my small contribution to this discussion.......for groundwater sampling in my business i use a pH, temp, elec. conductivity meter that also calculates total dissovled solids (TDS)..TDS and elec. conductivity are directly related. it is small, lightweight, rugged for extended field use, easy to use and maintain. it is extremely accurate for what it measures (pH to w/in +/- 0.01 pH units). the conductivity and TDS numbers provide a sense of the hardness and alkalinity as they are somewhat related in most fresh waters....i.e. in general the higher the dissolved CaCO3 and MgCO3 (which is hardness) the higher the TDS, alkalinity.

if interested the probe is manufactured by Hanna instruments, I believe the model number is HI991300, cost between $400-450 depending on where you get it, and what accessories you want with it. The pH probe needs routine and frequent calibration (an easy process) using inexpensive pH buffer solutions, everything else is factory calibrated basically for life of instrument.

all that being said.....do i go out and take regular measurements of my pond water?......no i dont.....i probably should since i have the equipment......but i am not that smart......i use this meter for work, but it would double wonderfully as a very accurate pond water measurement device if you want to invest that kind of money. i kind of like BC's post above, that's how i currently manage my pond.

D.I.E.D.,

Thank you for the explanation. I received a catalogue yesterday and was looking at a Hanna Combo.. "the only tester that measures ph, conductivity, TDS and temperature."

I wasn't sure of it's value in Pondmeistering.

I have a YSI 550 D.O./Temp meter that I very rarely use so I probably don't need to spend $145
on another tool that probably wouldn't get used enough to justify it's cost.

Thanks again.

Dan

No problem Dan,

in general, I didnt want to mislead anyone into thinking they dont have to monitor their pond water. depending on where yer at in this fine country you might have problems with yer pond water chemistry. pH in particular if yer near former or active industrial areas, nitrate if pond receives heavy ag run-off, etc.....its just that in my case i live in a fairly pristine watershed only potentially influenced by few and far between residential septic systems, the closest one about 10 acres away, so I just dont worry about my water quality, i know its good and i'm lucky.....and one of these fine days when i dont have much to do, i'll profile my general chemistry parameters just for my own info., every pondmeister should have an idea of their water quality..... myself included.

edited post.....Dan, i've used (rented) horiba and YSI DO meters in downhole well testing, they are great instruments. I dont own one, but have thought it would be really cool to vertically profile DO in pond throughout the summer with and without aeration.....just a money issue for me though, they arent cheap.

I've noticed alot of people use pool pH test kits for pH and that provides reasonable accuracy and it's cheap, so most can be satisfied. Others would like a research grade instrument until they see the price. There is an option for under $100, (albeit barely) it's called a pH turtle from Hanna Instruments and it's actually a pH measurement interface for a computer. it is capable of data logging, temperature correction and quite a bit more. All you need is a computer. (which all on the board have) If you have a laptop you can even take it down to the pond. Info can be had from Hanna Instruments Accurate pH, reasonable price, necessity....

whoops it's hard to find this thing on their web site, it's item HI9815 here\'s the specific page.
sorry!!!