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[APD] Re: Aquatic-Plants Digest, Vol 12, Issue 4



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 1. The landscaper contractor told my wife the shut of the waterfall (and
the only source of water surface transfer) during the hottest part of the
day 2:30 PM until 6:30 PM to control the temperature.  I say leave it on to
give on to provide more oxygen to the fish in the high temperature that we
get in Gainesville Florida during the summer.

2. The algae problem.  I would like to use Barley Straw extract to clear it
up, but on the other hand it does filter the sun from getting the fish.  I
do have a bridge crossing the center of the pond to over shade and some
plants also. This pond gets many hours of sun daily.  Next year the broader
plants will be high to offer more shading, but this year.

And to my collecting friends in NFC from the North Central Florida area the
pond warming party is coming soon.  JiM C.
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Jim, 
The idea behind the shut off during the day is to heat only the upper layer of the water while maintaining the thermal straification and the cooler water below, sort of as an "insulating layer". I'd personally not do this. A deeper pond would be better but at 4ft, I do not think this will matter much vs 6ft.

BSE is going to cost you a lot, I'd use the straw, not the Extract. Personally a bale of rotting straw has it's own ugly look to me.
Add some floating plants, there's plenty locally growing in the ditches around you all over Alachua Co. Lots of plants= low algae and gin clear water. It will also cool the water much better than floating mats of algae.
So the solution, add lots more plants, eg 50% of the surface should be covered and you can toss out excess as it grows.

It's very simple and works very for every person's pond I've ever worked on.
The only thing folks might want to add to a pond is a UV if they have green water issues during some periods. 
I personally like plants and have seen this work in both natural lakes/ponds and also in private artifical ponds.

Light is how plants mainly "outcompete" algae, so provide that(it's virtually free to collect weeds and add them if you live there).
If you remove the plants you get pea soup, if you have 30-50% coverage, then you have clear water. This is specific for FL lakes and ponds and the primary literature is available if you want to search IFSA's AWRC data base.

So you can listen to all sort of myths or you can do the simple thing that does work both on a scientific and a practical level.
Ponds are fairly straight forward, my parent's pond has never had any algae issues, nor my sister's non CO2 plant tank.
They don't do much besides remove plants every so often.

I'm perhaps better at ponds and lakes, moving water than I am at FW planted tanks. But this is not the pond list, nor do I frequent those list either. I instead work at a larger scale trying to beat these weeds back, growing them is not the problem for me. 

You should not have much seasonal issues in FL so you can grow the weeds year round. 
The solution is much more simple than you perhaps realize. 

Regards, 
Tom Barr 






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