Dang this string algae!

[JenH]

Ok. I have tried what several of you mentioned as far as using a toilet brush to pull this stuff out, but it isn't working. It's just not grabbing hold of it. I reached in today and yanked a bunch out with my hands. Don't really want to have to keep that up. I took some of my water into petsmart to have it tested. No ammonia, nitrites, nitrates. Can't remember everything they tested, but it was all safe/neutral. Except my ph/alkalinity is a little high, around 7.8/180. But from reading on here doesn't seem like that is high enough to be a problem. My fish seem to like swimming in it, so otherwise wouldn't care. But my pond is pretty small and it is covering the entire bottom up about 4-8" and off the sides just as far. It's also growing around the plants and all over the roots of the Water Hyacinth now too. My Anacharis is covered in it so much that I'm not even sure that plant is still growing. Its all along the pots of the water lilies too and while they seem to be replenishing leaves that die, they can never seem to generate more then 10 leaves. Seems like the aglae is taking over everything so that none of the other plants can grow, cept for the WH blooms.

Haven't put hydrogen peroxide in yet, because I have no way to remove this if it dies. Was going to borrow my dads shop vac this weekend and try to suck it all out. No idea if that will work. I've read that I can use a shop vac this way, but my dad seems to think that it will just fill up with water before it can suck anything else out and possibly ruin the vac somehow. He said it will just suck in water so fast that it will be full in a matter of seconds (his is 10 gallon I believe)

I really didn't up my bacteria doses after my pump shut off. Still no idea what effect that had on the bacteria. If my colonies died off some will it help if I go back to a daily dose for about a week? I hate to waste that stuff though.

 

[sissy]

A shop vac has an out let also for another hose and I just put on the second hose and put a laundry basket in the waterfall area and put the outlet hose in the laundry basket with batting or some type of fine filter stuff .This way the water goes in the shop vac and the shop vac should hold most of the string algae and what comes out the other end into the laundry basket will be filtered there and go right back into the pond .A 10 gallon one should work mine is a little bigger and is the blue and gray one from lowes .You just need to buy another hose .Ask at the store and tell them what you want to do and they should be able to show you better

 

[addy1]

If you wait it out, most likely you filter will catch up again, between the plants and the filter the string algae will start to be overcome.

 

[sissy]

the bacteria will grow back on it's own without help .

 

[JenH]

One more thing. I still have the bottom of my liner (its a preform) covered with river rock, 1 layer. I've been thinking about shoveling it out, and if I do a bunch of that algae will come with it, since thats where a lot of it is. Only thing I am afraid of is if we get a really hard rain, my liner lifting out of the ground. When we first built it, we had it in leveled, rock on the bottom, filled with water ready to go. Had water in it for a few week before I finally got my pump. The water was nasty so I used the pump to pump it all out. I just let it drain out about 5 feet from the pound and the whole liner lifted out of the ground. We had to start all over redig the hole, it was a huge mess!! And we have clay soil to boot. Now the first time, we dug the hole we just put in the liner and backfilled with landscaping dirt. The second time we dug the hole we backfilled with fine gravel and then just covered the top with dirt. Now, I don't really plan to ever have this thing empty again. But I don't know if the weight of the water is really enough to keep it in the ground, if I remove the rocks.

 

[ididntdoit99]

I cant remember how large your pond is, but a gallon of water weighs 8.34 pounds so I'm fairly sure the weight of rock you have in there is nothing in comparison with the weight of all the water you have.

 

[ididntdoit99]

Also... the more rock you take out... the more room there is for water... figure it this way; water density is 62.4 pounds per cubic foot, rock, depending on the type, is 120 to 190 pounds per cubic foot. (for my brains sake, we will just say rock is twice as heavy as water)

So if you take 100 pounds of rock out fo the bottom of your pound, you will have room for 50 pounds worth of water.

 

[taherrmann4]

At some point I would take the river rock out of the bottom of your pond, if you are worried about the liner lifting out of the ground you could always drop in a decent size rock or two to add weight. I don't have a preformed but during heavy rains my liner would balloon up so to counter this I took decent size rocks and strategically placed them around the bottom edges of the pond and I have not had the drastic ballooning effect. Water will get under it but it only raises it an inch or two in the middle. You could also try putting rocks around the lip of your pond to help hold it down, but this may not look right with your setup. Then you could grow something over the rock if you didn't like the look of all the rock.

 

[sissy]

Also... the more rock you take out... the more room there is for water... figure it this way; water density is 62.4 pounds per cubic foot, rock, depending on the type, is 120 to 190 pounds per cubic foot. (for my brains sake, we will just say rock is twice as heavy as water)

So if you take 100 pounds of rock out fo the bottom of your pound, you will have room for 50 pounds worth of water.

great info there

 

[ididntdoit99]

Yeah, I'm a dork, I know, my fiance tells me all the time. She says I'm a compulsive engineer, I have to figure out everything to the number, even when I'm not at work.

 

[sissy]

gosh would hate to go grocery shopping with you no offense LOL