We have a beautiful pond that is full of bluegill, some catfish and bass. However, in the last few years it has gotten this little green stuff on the top. After reading here, it appears that it is duckweed and something else... little tiny green stuff. Here's my question...

Is there something that will get rid of it for good in a chemical? If I do the manual dragging it off the pond, will it come back???

Is there something that I can do to make the pond less inviting for duckweed to survive- without hurting our fish?

What about pond blueing? Is that something that I should use to prevent algae growth?

I'm really new to pond care. Thanks in advance.

Your weed could be watermeal too. There is a thread on a drag rope someone created to manualy remove duckweed from the surface of their pond. Duck weed thrives in very calm waters without wind or wave action so areation might also help. Here is the drag rope thread.

http://www.pondboss.com/forums/ubbthreads.php?ubb=showflat&Number=35766&fpart=1

That's it... watermeal. I just couldn't think of the name of it when I posted... I think we have both. I read the drag rope post. If I drag it off, will it come back? Is that a perm. fix? If not, how often will I have to drag it off?

Our pond is a still water. Not much wind action where it sits. No electricity by the pond. Any ideas?

Here are the management options.

http://aquaplant.tamu.edu/database/floating_plants/watermeal_mgmt.htm

http://aquaplant.tamu.edu/database/floating_plants/common_duckweed_mgmt.htm

I don't think that manually trying to remove it will work. It will just keep coming back. I tried all kinds of chemicals to kill it with no success. Reward would knock it back but would not kill it completly. They say that Sonar and White cap are the only Chemicals that will kill it. I just added the white cap to my pond last week and it takes about 30 days to work. I will let you know In 30 day just how effective it was.

Awesome. Thanks so much for the information. Do you remember how expensive white cap is and how much to use??? What about Sonar?

SInce you're in Missouri contact Shawn Banks with midwest lake mgmt he can sell you some white cap and the exact amount you need based on water volume.

Thank you!

I would argue that even if you kill it all with chemicals it will still be back by next year at least. Besides, don't you have to hit every piece of it with chemical to kill it all? If that's the case you'll never kill it all anyway because there's many places it can hide. I can manually remove 95% of it and I still find that during the warmest weather I have to repeat the process every 2 to 3 weeks. Or is there a chemical that you can put into the water and it keeps it all from growing? That would be great and might work well. In warm whether DW will double itself every day based on what I've read about it.

I called the local Rural King store about Sonar. They said it cost $350 for a pint! I will look into other options for duckweed.

As mentioned white cap has same active compund as Sonar and is quite a bit cheaper. Since in IL why not contact nate herman, n8fly on this board, he sells both Soanr and White Cap. We sell them as well but he is closer. Good luck.

BZ you 100% correct on what you said as far as contact herbicides such as Reward it takes mutiple applicaitosn and you have to touch it. The DW will take back over in no time. We haev gotten rid of it with repeat applicatiosn of Reward but not esy to do.

This is not how Flouridone works it is a concentration and will work to eradicate all plant live at high enough ( 90 ppb) rate). Unless the watermeal or duckweed is reintroduced from upstream source, geese, etc. Then it might just be gone for good. It is much more money than contact herbicides of course.