Mark

Pond Fresh Filters – Calclulating Flow Rate

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There’s no question that the Pond Fresh Dechlorinating filter is a handy tool to have around when you’re topping off your pond or filling it up at the start of the season. If you use a municipal water supply, it’s virtually certain that you’ll find some concentration of chlorine or chloramines in the water, and … Read more

Dissolved Oxygen Testing For Ponds

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There are a few things we know for sure. 

Hot weather is brutal on ponds and fish, and we’ve had a lot of that kind of weather lately.

Just this week, MSN of all places profiled this news article on the homepage.

And, other than watching your fish gasp at the surface of the water for air, or float belly up, you don’t really have any idea how much dissolved oxygen is in your pond right now.  There’s simply no way to tell that kind of thing with the naked eye.

Yet this thing called DO for short, is vital to the life and well-being of any pond and if you have fish, it’s critical.  Fish, as you probably guessed, are not air breathers like those of us of the mammalian persuasion.  Fish have gills which work to extract dissolved oxygen from the water and they’re generally pretty efficient at this work if a fish is healthy.

But major problems can arise at various times of the year, or even certain times of day, when DO can fluctuate to very low levels.  It’s important to remember that ponds, no matter how stable and unchanging they may appear, are not static environments.  Elements in them are always experiencing change.  pH levels will rise and fall during the day, and temperature of course, and along with that, dissolved oxygen can change too.

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Frisky Koi And Limiting Overproduction

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On the one hand, it’s great to have happy and healthy fish. This is as it should be if you’re doing a good job at managing your Koi pond. On the other hand, happy and healthy fish are usually really good at making more fish. Or maybe it’s the other way around.

Anyway, this can often pose a bit of a problem for the pond owner.

We know that too many fish in a small pond will cause issues that are very common. Algae, in any form, and this means green water, string algae, hair algae, you name it, will likely appear because of high nutrient loading in the water from the fish waste. If these same nutrients end up getting so high that the natural cleaning and balancing mechanisms in the pond can’t keep up, you could end up seeing an ammonia spike, and this can be deadly for the fish. Neither of these issues are something you really want to deal with.

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Summertime Fish Kills And How To Avoid Them

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As a pond algae specialist (we all have to grow up to be something right?:) I make a point to keep tabs on the various happenings around the U.S. on algae and came across this article on a recent fish kill in a community pond.

This is just one incident that got publicized somewhat, where many others simply go unreported, but let’s just say that mid-summer fish kills aren’t all that uncommon.

High temperatures are largely to blame because once you see air temps getting into the high 80’s and beyond, it’s a fairly good bet that in some ponds the water temperature will be near or above 78 degrees and that’s kind of a magic number. Higher than this and the water’s ability to hold on to dissolved oxygen will begin to drop and DO is critical to fish health.

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Can Koi Fish And Pond Plants Co-exist?

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As many of you know, green water is a common issue in tons of small fish ponds. And one of the best ways I have always suggested to deal with it is with a combination of beneficial pond bacteria and desirable plants. But there’s a problem with this advice, at least where a Koi pond is concerned.

It’s fairly well known and confirmed by many pond owners that Koi fish love to eat almost anything. This includes some of the more desirable pond plants that you’ll find in most water gardens. Lilies, hyacinth, grasses and so on, are often preferred forage material for the usually ravenous Koi. It’s so common an occurrence that many pond owners just assume the you can’t have Koi and plants in the same pond.

But such is not the case…fortunately.

In fact, while most Koi have an insatiable appetite, not all of them will end up eating plants to any great degree. In some cases it may be because they’re more accustomed, happy, and well nourished by traditional fish food. Or perhaps they just haven’t developed a particular taste for the type of plants found in pond. For whatever the reason, it’s simply not a given that Koi will eat your pond plants into oblivion.

But they can…unfortunately.

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Toxic Algae In Farm Pond Kills Cattle In Georgia

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Compared to how common algae blooms are across the country in the summer months, you don’t hear about the potential hazards of algae all that much. But a recent article in Beef Magazine caught my eye because it involved the death of four cows that were killed from contact or most likely ingestion with a toxic form of algae.

Before we delve into this topic I want to stress that this is not something to panic over or get crazy worried about. Toxic algae is nothing new. It’s been a part of our world since, well the beginning or pretty close to it. The vast majority of algae will never develop toxicity or cause this kind of problem however it’s important to note that the risk exists and what you can do about the algae if it shows up.

In the article you’ll see that a few specific things were talked about. Blue green algae and cyanobacteria were mentioned and specifically a species called microsystis was highlighted. What’s interesting to note is that in many of our algae tests and samplings sent to us from around the country, microsystis is probably the most common algae that’s found in nearly every pond or lake. So obviously it doesn’t always produce toxins, and researchers still don’t know why it starts to in particular cases. Ultimately the only sure fire way to deduce that toxicity is present is to test for it after it’s created.

It’s likely, that in most cases, it’s also a matter of density. When populations of this blue green algae are high and abundant, the chances of toxin production are likely to increase. What you’ll see in the water may vary from a green or brown tint turning into a much thicker, paint like appearance to floating slicks or masses. Colors may also vary from green and brown to red and blue.

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