Cleaning pond liner

[Bossman]

I have an 800 gallon above ground pound with a liner. The line has a light coating of green algae. My wife says I should brush it off, and it will easily come off, and I say the fish will nibble on it. The algae is not long or stringy and my water is clear. So what is everyone's opinion. I say leave it alone. I am new at this and the pond has only been up and running 6 months.

 

[mrsclem]

leave it, you are correct that the fish will nibble on it.

 

[poconojoe]

You came to the right place to get an education on ponding. Read through the many posts here and you will be amazed at all the information given by all the friendly members.

So, about your question:
Never clean that off. It serves a purpose. You said your water is clear. Leave well enough alone. Your pond is doing good, so why mess with it?

As you stated, the fish will nibble on it. Plus, it is an important part of the pond's natural cycle of absorbing excess nutrients created by fish waste.
Algae is a plant and plants feed on those excess nutrients which helps keep your water clean. Think of it as a part of your filtration system.

Also, what would you rather see? An unnatural black rubber liner or a nice natural looking green surface?

 

[sissy]

Always leave the good stuff on the liner as it helps water quality and feeds the fish and helps with the spring start up of the pond

 

[addy1]

Agree with above, leave it!

 

[GBBUDD]

What is green and slimy to us is caviar to your fish.

 

[Phaewryn]

I have an 800 gallon above ground pound with a liner. The line has a light coating of green algae. My wife says I should brush it off, and it will easily come off, and I say the fish will nibble on it. The algae is not long or stringy and my water is clear.

Tell your wife it is a pond, not an aquarium, and if she wants an 800 gallon aquarium, she needs to be the one in there cleaning it constantly. Yes, you can keep a pond clean and clear like an aquarium, but it is a lot of work because ponds have SUN whereas aquariums do not - and aquariums placed near windows, if you've ever done it, are a huge hassle to keep algae out of because of the sun. Your wife is fighting a losing battle: ponds are not aquariums. I have a very small pond (about 75 gallons all told) and I do keep mine clean like an aquarium, but it is a lot of work and my pond only gets a few hours of evening sun: no way it's gonna happen in 800 gallons in the sun.

 

[Nevermore44]

ha. My father in law use to empty his 600g pond once or twice a year because he wanted to clean off the liner. It took years of telling him that it's not an aquarium to get him to stop. The pond isn't isolated from nature... so within a short time it will be right back.

 

[Johnryall]

You came to the right place to get an education on ponding. Read through the many posts here and you will be amazed at all the information given by all the friendly members.

So, about your question:
Never clean that off. It serves a purpose. You said your water is clear. Leave well enough alone. Your pond is doing good, so why mess with it?

As you stated, the fish will nibble on it. Plus, it is an important part of the pond's natural cycle of absorbing excess nutrients created by fish waste.
Algae is a plant and plants feed on those excess nutrients which helps keep your water clean. Think of it as a part of your filtration system.

Also, what would you rather see? An unnatural black rubber liner or a nice natural looking green surface?

I have a follow up question, my 155g preformed pond with goldfish that are over 20 years old turned completely dark green and no amount of filtering seems to get rid of it. It was clear- ish for about 6 years after I set it up. I was just redoing the rocks around it and going to redo the netting on top and noticed the pond settled so it’s no longer level. So I drained the water, keeping it in barrels and the 7 fish in the barrels as well. I’ve read here to not scrub the sides of the pond as it is natural but Should I not put all clear water into the pond? I have a 100g barrel with tap water sitting to the side to off vapor. Should I add some of the original dark green back into it? Thank you.

 

[brokensword]

I have a follow up question, my 155g preformed pond with goldfish that are over 20 years old turned completely dark green and no amount of filtering seems to get rid of it. It was clear- ish for about 6 years after I set it up. I was just redoing the rocks around it and going to redo the netting on top and noticed the pond settled so it’s no longer level. So I drained the water, keeping it in barrels and the 7 fish in the barrels as well. I’ve read here to not scrub the sides of the pond as it is natural but Should I not put all clear water into the pond? I have a 100g barrel with tap water sitting to the side to off vapor. Should I add some of the original dark green back into it? Thank you.

sort of depends; if you leave your preform empty for too long, the good stuff is going to die and you'll be starting all over again with NPS (new pond syndrome).
This is going to stress both you and the fish, so monitor and don't over feed. Depending on where you live, i.e. temps, if the fish are going dormant for winter, no problem not feeding. If you're in an area where the fish are still active, the NPS is going to hit. IF you can, strain/sieve the water you saved before you put it back but the good stuff was on the walls, NOT in the water, so fresh water will be fine except you have to worry about matching the pH, adding any dechlor, and temp should be within 5 degrees with any acclimatization being a SLOW process so the fish can get adjusted. In the future, plan on working fast i.e. taking out the water, cleaning the bottof of any guck, putting the water back in and then the fish. This way, you minimize workload AND stress on the both of you.

If you have bog, it'll help; if reg mech filters, hopefully the pads did not dry off and you have some good bacteria there. Your dark green water WON'T be clear by filtering (single cell algae is too small to get out by conventional pads/filters) so you're going to have some no matter what but that free floating algae may be saving your fish as it's THEY who are eating the excess DOCs in your pond. That amount of floating green means you need more bio filtering and lots of plants!



Good Luck!

 

[poconojoe]

I'm wondering why the sudden green water.

Just to mention:
Usually when your water turns pea soup green (algae bloom) it's an indication of excess nutrients, basically a lot of fish poo and pee.

An algae bloom is nature's way of correcting the imbalance. Algae are floating plants that feed on the excess nutrients. If they didn't do that, the water would build up so much waste, everything would probably die.

You can add lots of plants to compete with and get rid of the algae.

Too much direct sunlight can help the algae grow as well. Some form of shade might help.

Sometimes what happens is your pond might have reached a tipping point where the fish have grown and your filter is not up to the task. Too much poop!

As far as using completely new water or mixing in some existing water, I'm not sure. I don't want to give you bad advice. Hopefully someone will chime in that can answer that.

 

[poconojoe]

Oh, not to be a downer...but if you have not corrected the initial cause of the green water, chances are that your brand new clean water will also green up in the very near future.

Ah, I see @brokensword was typing at the same time!
All great points he brought up.

Get some plants in there if your climate at this time of year is tolerable. Floating plants are great. You just throw them in. All the ones I use are tropical though, so they can't survive my zone 6b winters.

 

[Johnryall]

sort of depends; if you leave your preform empty for too long, the good stuff is going to die and you'll be starting all over again with NPS (new pond syndrome).
This is going to stress both you and the fish, so monitor and don't over feed. Depending on where you live, i.e. temps, if the fish are going dormant for winter, no problem not feeding. If you're in an area where the fish are still active, the NPS is going to hit. IF you can, strain/sieve the water you saved before you put it back but the good stuff was on the walls, NOT in the water, so fresh water will be fine except you have to worry about matching the pH, adding any dechlor, and temp should be within 5 degrees with any acclimatization being a SLOW process so the fish can get adjusted. In the future, plan on working fast i.e. taking out the water, cleaning the bottof of any guck, putting the water back in and then the fish. This way, you minimize workload AND stress on the both of you.

If you have bog, it'll help; if reg mech filters, hopefully the pads did not dry off and you have some good bacteria there. Your dark green water WON'T be clear by filtering (single cell algae is too small to get out by conventional pads/filters) so you're going to have some no matter what but that free floating algae may be saving your fish as it's THEY who are eating the excess DOCs in your pond. That amount of floating green means you need more bio filtering and lots of plants!



Good Luck!

View attachment 145274

Thank you so much. This is exactly what I needed to hear. I almost busted out some bleach to scrub the sides. I emptied the pond and removed it just before dark and we had a very humid night and I’ll be leveling the sub terrain this morning and resetting the pond liner in place, putting half of the clear water ive had set to the side for over 24 hours and start to re introduce fish Along with their original pond water ( about 50g or so ). I’m in Oklahoma and overnight temp was 51°f and today will be mid 70’s. Thanks again, happy holidays.

 

[brokensword]

Thank you so much. This is exactly what I needed to hear. I almost busted out some bleach to scrub the sides. I emptied the pond and removed it just before dark and we had a very humid night and I’ll be leveling the sub terrain this morning and resetting the pond liner in place, putting half of the clear water ive had set to the side for over 24 hours and start to re introduce fish Along with their original pond water ( about 50g or so ). I’m in Oklahoma and overnight temp was 51°f and today will be mid 70’s. Thanks again, happy holidays.

Just realize, 'setting tap water aside' may not take out the chlorine if it's in a chloramine form; that is, in the 'old days' tap water ONLY had chlorine, now it's chloramine, which won't dissiptate for 30 days, hence you'll still need dechlor to keep the fish from being stressed/dying. Depends on your community as SOME still ONLY have the chlorine. I'd be safe and add the dechlor as you ad the 'set aside' water.