Before you consider treating your pond with biological or chemical products it is important to test the water for nutrients and chemical composition. Once you have this benchmark information it will be more effective to make application adjustments according to your goals. How often should you test the water? Once you initiate a treatment program I would suggest testing every four weeks to collect data that can be graphed and reviewed.
This is our testing format based on general acceptable limits:
Dissolved Oxygen grreater than 4.0mg/liter at the pond bottom
Alkalinity (CaCO3) 50-200 ppm
Hardness 100-400 ppm
pH 6.5 – 9.5 measured over 24hrs and averaged
Phosphorous (phosphate) 0.01-0.3 ppm
Ammonia (NH3) 0.0 – 0.25 ppm
Nitrite less than 1.o ppm for most ponds with fish
Nitrate less than 0.2 ppm
It is very seldom that the water chemistry of any two ponds will be the same. Once you establish a baseline for your pond, being proactive is easier and usually more cost effective. Avoid turning your beautiful pond into a science experiment.
