Pond Boss Forums INTRO Questions & Observations Aquashade to control filamentous algea

Hi team, hope your Winter is going well.

My one acre Ohio pond experiences FA blooms that require me to manually rake the edges a few time a year. Most do the pond has 1 - 3 sloped edges with one area with a shallower slope. The water max depth is 10 feet and the water is very clear allowing one to see the bottom in 6 feet of water when un-dyed.

I have applied Aquashade sporadically over the past couple of years but not consistently. I’ve applied dye to a current level of visibility of 3 1/2 feet. My question for the group is to what level of visibility should I keep the point set to to control the FA but not negatively affect the productivity of the pond? I feed daily and supply minnows and shiners occasionally.

Thanks, Tony

I think everything I have seen is 18-24" when it comes to depth in the pond relating to the secchi disk and fertilization. Less than 18" = hold off on treatment. Greater than 18" = get ready to treat again. My assumption is that the pond dye follows the same principals.

I'm betting there is more to the story on this though. Probably nature's way of using up some of the nutrients in the pond.

How's your aquatic vegetation situation? What types do you have if any?

Typically plants (algae too) will grow about 18" deeper than you can get a secchi disk reading. I wouldn't be that concerned with the amount of dye you put in, but I am guessing you use the pond to get water for the house?

I'd get underwater weeds established, that will utilize many of the nutrients in the pond once they start growing and you will have less algae. Stock 40# of tilapia and treat the algae with Cutrine Plus to kill it all (you will have to use both liquid and granular) within 5 days of stocking the tilapia and I bet your algae problem will be minimal the rest of the year.

My pond currently has 20-24” visibility with the disk, most of the year there is a lot of American pond weed and Cara growing. We had a hard freeze with 8” of ice on the pond, 3 days after the ice melt the Algae has gotten crazy, I know my pond is nutrient rich but dang, the growth is wild, water temp is currently 50*. Just waiting for it to warm up a bit so Snipe can bring me some Tilapia . the aqua shade hasn’t done much of anything in my case even though I didn’t put in as much as recommended

Aquashade reduces pond productivity directly proportionally to how dark you make the water blue. The darker it is the fewer plants that grow which is how it basicaly works. Label says to use it best use 1 part per million. So 1/2 gallon in 500,000 gallons or 1 gallon for each 1,000,000 gallons. Company says adding more than 1ppm does not significantly reduce the plant growth more than 1ppm. Some pro-pond managers disagree with this statement for certain types of plants/algae.

If you put enough tilapia in the pond all the algae will be eaten. The time it takes depends on how many tilapia you stock. Best method is what esshup suggested reduce amount of algae prior to stocking tilapia so you don't need as many tilapia. Each TP can only eat so much algae per day or week. If you kill a lot of the algae prior to tilapia you can first try 20-24 lbs of tilapia. If they don't control the algae use closer to 40 lbs TP next year. If you have LMB they will eat the baby tilapia who are also important to have present eating the small new algae growths. In that case with fewer TP babies more adult TP need to be stocked. Larger ponds are nice BUT they always require more time and MONEY to manage.