Foam on Pond Surface: Dissolved Organics & Aeration

From: Randall

Sent: Tuesday, October 07, 2008 3:45 AM

To: Anthony Roocroft

Subject: Re: Pond Sludge, Bottom Drains & Vacuums

Hello Mr. Roocroft

Thank you for your articles which I received with appreciations.

I always look forward to your articles as I am a hands on man myself.

I have 2 ponds a big and a small one.

The size of my ponds are 30 tons and 4 tons of water.

I have some questions - how to remove bubbles on the surface of my smaller pond?

What causes this to happen? What are these bubbles - are they proteins or nitrates or both?

I have a water fall with allot of surface air inter-action.

I know of a protein remover or skimmer - is it simple to make one?

The fact is if this is occuring - something is not right - what is the problem.

My filter size is about 30% of my pond capacity.

Bio filters is on the last chamber.

I have bottom drain on each filter chamber which I drain some water every day.

PH is 7.5

Best regards

Randall

Hi, Randall,

The bubbles are the result of the presence of "oily" organics or other forms of "Dissolved Organic Content" (DOC). Protein skimmers are designed to remove this surface problem but I couldn't advise on how to build one.

Perhaps you should look at the type of food you use and make sure it is of high quality from reputable manufacturer since this is probably the source of your problem.

Other sources of organics are an over-stock of fish (and other aquatic animals especially frogs) and amount of food fed.

A product such as Viresco Aqua which contains an organic digester will help to remove and control but not overnight. It will take some time.

Tony