# pond turn-over???



## chopper (May 15, 2004)

Could this be even possible? I have an acre pond in central Ohio that developed a brown scum on it and the fish stopped feeding. It looks like a turn over to me. But its only late August.


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## Bad Bub (Jan 17, 2006)

Very possible! Water is cooling fast right now, and a pond heats all the way to the bottom more so than a lake will. It doesn't take as much of a cooling trend to cause a pond to turn over. My buddy's pond some years will do this a few times as the air temps fluctuate up and down with the change of seasons...

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## chopper (May 15, 2004)

Thanks, Bad. It looked like a lake turn over to me. I just thought that it was way to early. You are right, it was so hot and then this sudden drop. The fish really acted like a turn over also.


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## [email protected] (Feb 29, 2008)

A hard cold rain or a strong persistent wind can also turn over a pond/lake. Long term, install diffused aeration. It is not a matter of IF you will have a fish kill from turnover its a matter of WHEN. As a pond ages fish mortality becomes more and more likely because of the accumulation of decomposing organic matter which puts a higher and higher demand on oxygen levels. We have aeration systems that start at $700.00 and they are really the single best thing you can do to promote a healthy environment.


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## bkr43050 (Apr 5, 2004)

Not to discourage anyone from buying your aerator systems but I just had a question about the this. In a small pond I imagine some folks would find an aeration system hard to justify so I was wondering about other steps that one can take to eliminate/minimize the impact of these turnovers. Is it worthwhile for folks to do any sort of manual removal of vegetation? I know that I have seen various items advertised to do this. I realize that many of these are rather labor intensive but I perhaps people are like me and have more time than money.


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## [email protected] (Feb 29, 2008)

Aeration is the single best way to deal with excess nutrients and decomposing vegetation once they are in the pond. In the long run anything you can do to remove/prevent organic matter or nutrients from entering the pond is defiantly going to reduce the probability of a fish kill. Examples include removing vegetation, buffer areas to prevent erosion and clean surface runoff, rip rap to prevent bank erosion, exclusion of livestock, using low phosphorus lawn fertilizer (if any), exclude septic leaching, ect., ect.

BKR I think there are a lot of folks out there with more time than money with this economy; i guess it depends on what you pay for labor


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