...to "Quarter Acre Cesspool". My pond looked very promising the first year that it filled after being de-mucked. It's now in it's 4th summer. Ever since then the water has consistently gotten worse in appearance. This year, the clarity has been no better than 12" and the worst of it is that the surface cycles in and out of various levels of scummy, filmy, bubbly, surface conditions. I've given up trying to make a difference and have resorted to just waiting...
I'm not posting to to get solutions here...I just want to rant a bit as this pond dream is testing my patience. My mind wants to solve the problem and on the flip side...I cannot devote the time and money into filtering this cesspool with an industrial sewer treatment system.
Excerpt from Robert Crais' "The Monkey's Raincoat:" "She took another microscopic bite of her sandwich, then pushed it away. Maybe she absorbed nutrients from her surroundings."
Not that it's any consolation, but my pond has been suffering the scummy, filmy, bubbly, surface conditions since the weather turned hot a few weeks back.
QA, do you aerate? Do you think that might speed your pond finding it's new normal after the massive change in conditions?
This is the 3rd summer with aeration. 3 diffusers getting just over 1 CFM per head. All raised off the bottom 3 feet in 10, 7 and 6 foot of water....running about 12 hours a night. If it is improving the situation...I'd hate to see what it would do without it! Although, I have thought about turning the air off just to find out. Then again, there are so many variables, would I really know if it was the true cause and affect?
When the pond get's to the photo'd stage, the aerators will have pushed the floaties out about 20 foot radius from plumes. Then the air shuts off and within a minute the stuff has converged back as it noting was going on.
It can be real interesting in the evening because you can see the water currents in the pond especially without a breeze. There will be multiple shades/colors of current flows (some several feet wide) that tend to swirl towards the center. I suspect it is the way the air gently moves down the ravine and pulls the surface water and causes the pond to slowly churn. If you look closely at the first pic, you can see in the top right corner - a darker streak that follows the far bank and tapers off just before the decoys that mark one of my diffusers. Photo does not do it justice...it's much more intense in person (both interesting and disgusting).
QAC.......welcome to my world! half acre pond, all clay, never clear, bullheads moved in during our floods and now with the HOT weather here in Michigan, HOT being in the 90's near 100 since July 1st, might get down to the 80's on Friday. Have lost 18 inches of water in the pond and this is what it has been like for 6 years! I do have bass, never seen them but do see the waves as they attack the BG. Added CC about 4 years ago, were not suppose to spawn...BUT did and the chocolate milk pond continues. Yes, this is a rant, but it looked like to good place for it. We all love our ponds, it is just they do not love us back.....and that hurts! Enjoy the rest of the season...winter is coming
half-acre pond, LMB, HBG, BG, GSH and CC ....goal is to have fun fishing. And I subscribe!
Thanks Funky for allowing a little "misery loves company". As far as I know I have no catfish or carp. I did catch a carp early on that must have slipped in with the FHM's, but surely I would be seeing them at feeding time it there were more. My pond holds water very well...I haven't seen any rain run-off for over a week and the pond is down about an inch or 2. It's stretches like this without rain that the surface turns into a petri dish. The cesspool gets very little wind action too. I did take water tests yesterday evening and found the Phosphates and Ammonia to be higher than usual...Phos @ 0.50 ppm and Ammonia between 0.25 and 0.50 ppm. The Nitrites, pH, TDS, and temps were all in good order. The DO was in the lower ranges, as usual, as well as the clarity...
Temps - ranged 88 to 81, Top to bottom,, pH - ranged 8.0 to 7.5, 6" down to 30" down, Nitrites - 0 ppm, TDS - 78 ppm Secchi - 10" DO - 7.9 to 3.5 ppm, 6" down to 30" down.
I don't know enough to make any conclusions with the data other than I have a new land lease tenant and he may have fertilized more this year than the last one did. There has been no cattle on the place this year, however...he has been merely haying some of the fields.
They're calling for rain over the next 24 hours...that usually breaks the cycle or knocks it down.
Dragging an old thread of mine up since I finally got the nerve to NOT run the aeration system this year.
Coincidence or related, I'm not sure, but...
Every year since the pond was 1 year old with aeration run, the pond would go through at least a few phases of substantial surface scum in the heat of the summer. This year I have left the air off and no sign of it getting out of hand. I have seen very mild surface yuck start this year. Twice, it has started, but does not amount to anything...maybe a couple hundred square feet of very mild light brownish-green surface film and it lasts a day, maybe. What little breeze the pond sees must be taking care of these minor accumulations of floaties.
We have been in a drought most of this year so disrupting any surface films has been at a minimum since rains would typically knock the worst of outbreaks down for a few days. The pond is about 10 inches low and the water clarity is at 18"...best it's ever been this time of year. I've not been checking water conditions or temps, but the fish (HSB, BG, HBG, & CC) have been feeding better than ever. Feeding time is finally a consistent joy. I even saw an 8" CC last night vacuuming up pellets, only one, but the CC I stocked in early '21 were at least 12 inches long, most over a pound, and are now in the 20 inch range and 3-4 pounds ...at least one pair of CC have managed to reproduce.
Pond seems to be the healthiest it's ever been!
The only thing I can think of that would relate aeration to my previous scum problems is that aeration was keeping the pond turned over, keeping the water column the same temp throughout (like you would expect), which may have promoted the scum types to thrive in much higher concentrations than without all the turnover and constant temps.
Coincidence or related to aeration???
If it's related to aeration...so much for aeration being better for my pond. The worst of summer is still to come, but I have always seen severe breakouts by this time of year.
Either way, it's been great being able to see my fish feed, feed extremely consistently, and be able to ID them with a clearer pond.
My 2 cents-and it's worth what you're paying for it... I don't think every pond is a candidate for (in particular) bottom diffused aeration. Soil types, water conditions, changing weather all have an effect on final outcome-ironically, a moving target. Keeping sediment and other organisms in suspension may not always be best. I say this because some soil types want to stay up in the water column naturally. I don't know all of the science behind it, don't know that anybody really knows the entire story, but we can only observe the situation from making changes and trying to figure out what it affected. Some are more obvious than others, some show up 2-3 years down the road. As long as you don't have an anoxic layer from hell forming in the deepest part of basin, maybe it'll be fine. I too, like to see my fish going crazy feeding with improvements in clarity. What we won't know for a period going through fall and again in spring, what is going on in the deep dark water, and as you say "the worst of summer is yet to come". I hope it's uneventful for you.
Darn it Q A, I was just traveling down 65 by your place and back the last several days, went down to Truman Lake with the RV and stayed a couple days, coming home this morning, I was thinking about you, had not heard from you on this forum for a while and hoping everything was still ok with you. The last I had heard from you some time ago you were going to head in a different direction and add some CC to your pond, was wondering how that was working out? they will definitely alleviate your crawdad problems, I bet you don't have anywhere near as many of those rambling around in your pond, they love the things.
Have you caught or ate any of your CC? I have a bunch still hanging around the feeder, they are upwards of six lbs by now, also see some smaller ones so definitely have had some hatch out, not sure how thrilled I am about that, almost wish I hadn't put any in my pond. I am having a devil of a time catching the suckers, they have definitely got hook smart, or then they are just full from hanging around the feeder and dont care for my stink bait that I offer up for them.
Could it be that those crawdads were keeping your water turbid? you definitely had a bunch of them.
My water is clearer this year then it has ever been, usually in the late fall it would clear up a good bit but this summer it is really clean looking.
All the really good ideas I've ever had came to me while I was milking a cow.
All's good with me and mine, I've switched to an old car project and old Pontiac research has taken up my forum time...besides the pond is on autopilot!
I did add CC and the craw population plummeted. The CC got big a bit faster, I'm sure. There are still a few craws, but it's an odd day that you see one. Haven't trapped the last two seasons.
A few CC have been caught this year...nice and healthy and a fun catch...they were returned to get hook shy...lol
My take on my pond is that the aeration kept the whole pond at/or above 80°F and was turning it over for max sun exposure (during the hot months) and it was conducive to the funk. The craws were surely contributing to the suspended matter, but the cats must not be. Anyhow, the little pond looks better than it ever has with good-to-decent shore plant coverage.
Looks like a losing battle to me - been there done that - I finally found a different pond
Definitely not a lost cause. I'm hoping it's coming into its own. This has been the best year yet, so far! Fish are big and plentiful, water is more clear than previous years this time of the season, catching has been easier and impressive, and no scum to look at. It may not be a big BOW with record fish, but I really enjoy feeding time and taking the granddaughter there to catch 20-30 fish with a fly. in an hour.
I'll give it next year without aeration and go from there. May convert the air-pump-house to a fountain-pump-house for mere aesthetics. I need to ladder stock some more HSB and a few more CC...I'm thinking.