Pond Treatments

Most ponds and lakes build up material faster than nature can process it. Leaves, fish waste and decaying vegetation settle to the bottom, nutrients accumulate, and clarity and smell gradually get worse.

A treatment addresses one specific part of that cycle. The problems people bring to us most often are:

• cloudy or grey water with fine floating particles
• black organic muck on the bottom, in beach areas or along shorelines
• string algae and blooms that keep returning
• slick biofilm or dark staining on stream beds, waterfalls and rocks
• a pond that will not cycle properly after a fill or a spring start-up

Reducing the phosphate that feeds an algae bloom usually holds results longer than treating the bloom on its own.

Beneficial bacteria

Bacteria break down fish waste, leaves and plant material biologically, including the settled muck layer on the bottom.

Choose bacteria when the problem is organic load: cloudy water from waste, sludge, smells or constant maintenance. AquascapePRO Beneficial Bacteria is a dry concentrate for ponds and small lakes, and Aquascape Lake Bacteria Packs are water-soluble packs for larger water. Pond Starter Bacteria seeds a new filter colony, so use it at new pond fill, after a full water change and at spring start-up.

Flocculants and clarifiers

Flocculants clump fine suspended particles into larger ones that either settle out or get caught by your filter.

Choose a flocculant when the water is cloudy or muddy-brown from clay, mineral sediment or silt rather than biological waste. Rapid Clear is for pond-scale cloudiness, and Aquascape Lake Flocculant Clarifier covers larger water. If the cloudiness is green, it is algae and a flocculant is not the right treatment.

Sludge and muck removers

These packs sink and dose the bottom layer directly instead of dispersing through the water above it.

Choose sludge packs when the problem is a soft, smelly bottom in a lake, beach area or shoreline, and you want to spot-treat one area rather than treat the whole water body.

Phosphate binders

Phosphate is the nutrient algae grows on, and it enters ponds and lakes through runoff, waterfowl and decaying matter.

Choose a phosphate binder when algae keeps returning and you want to reduce the nutrient feeding it rather than treat the algae itself. The packs are water-soluble, so you can toss them onto inflow points and shallow margins where nutrient load concentrates.

Stream, waterfall and rock cleaners

These treat wet surfaces that ordinary pond bacteria cannot hold onto, because the water moves past too fast.

Choose SAB Stream & Pond Cleaner when stream beds, waterfall faces and spillways have a slick organic film and you still have circulation through them. Choose Waterfall & Rock Cleaner when rock surfaces are stained and you want direct application with no dilution, or when the water is too cold for biological treatments to be doing much.

Pond dye

Blue dye tints the water so less sunlight reaches submerged weeds and algae at depth.

Choose dye packs when you want to slow submerged growth through the season and make fish harder for herons and other predators to see. Dye works better as prevention than as a fix for growth that is already established.

AquascapePRO is the professional-grade line, and those formulations are around 25% stronger than the retail versions.

Two things decide what to order: the problem you are solving, and how much water or surface you are treating.

• Pond-scale liquids and dry concentrates are dosed by volume. One container of Rapid Clear or Pond Starter Bacteria treats up to 96,000 gallons, SAB Stream & Pond Cleaner treats up to 45,000 gallons per container, and Beneficial Bacteria treats up to 672,000 gallons per container.
• Lake packs are measured by area or acre-feet. Lake Bacteria Packs are dosed four per 1/4 acre each month, Lake Flocculant Clarifier covers up to 1/4 acre for up to 3 months, and one Lake Blue Dye Pack treats up to 1.5 acre-feet.
• Surface treatments are measured by surface area. Waterfall & Rock Cleaner covers up to 3,650 square feet per container, and Phosphate Binder Packs treat up to 250 square feet each.

For a small backyard water garden, the dry concentrates and liquids are easier to dose than lake packs. Save the packs for water large enough that measuring by the gallon stops being practical.