Aquaflite two man mini-sub

[Guest]

Pond water clarity is a

Pond water clarity is a subject close to my heart, since my clubs pond went pea green and remained that way last year.

Basically it boils down to one thing- too much nutriment in the water, which enables algae to flourish resulting in murky water.

This can be through rotting vegetation i.e. leaves in the bottom, Canadian geese poop etc.

In effect the pond becomes an open sewer.

If the water only has a small amount of nutriment, then it will likely go a bit murky for a while, until the algae saps all the nutriment from the water, whereupon the algae dies of starvation and sinks to the bottom.

There are only two solutions to this.

Regular cleaning of the pond, chemical treatment (biological or industrial) and/or filtration.

Natural ponds or springs don't suffer from this, because they have a natural exchange of water, so the water nutriment never rises to critical levels. Where natural ponds occur, and are largely stagnant, you will usually find that lots of water plants start to grow in the pond i.e. water lillies, reeds etc. which leach the nutriment from the water.

Unfortunately, this doesn't make for a very navigable pond!

Andy

[steveuk]

Aha. There is a huge

Aha. There is a huge population of Canadian geese and a smaller population of ducks too. They all graze next to the lake and also eat up all the bread which the public insist on bringing! ..and then they dump all around, and I suspect in, the water.

There is a small feed from a stream which comes into the lake and out the other end ...maybe when there is a deluge of rain the lake gets more clean water flowing through it. Also the Canadian geese population seems to shrink now and then - not sure if they are migrating or if someone is 'managing' their size.

[Guest]

The lakes at St Albans,

The lakes at St Albans, Hertfordshire had a problem with water pollution.

They tackled it in three ways

1. Removed many of the fish from the pond, and reduced the duck and geese population.

2. Added some water plants to one corner of the pond, and placed a step into the pond. Different levels allow the growth of different water plants.

3. Improved the water flow into the ponds from nearby rivers. the original design of the ponds had allowed this, but the local water company had been sucking dry the rivers for years. The reduction in industry in the area meant this was no longer necessary, so the supply to the ponds was restored.

The end result is a large lake which is crystal clear. The boating pond adjacent to the larger lake is a green mess. Unsurprisingly it has none of these measures.

Andy