Normal Stages for New Pond Water

[Kristi Kelty]

Can someone please advise me as to the normal stages for new pond water (color, clarity, etc.) I have had my pond for 2.5 weeks and the water is green, fairly clear, but there is brownish growth/film on the liner under the water. Is this to be expected?
Thanks!

 

[fishin4cars]

Water clarity can vary from pond to pond, No two ever start up the same way. But yes what our seeing is fairly normal. It takes between 5-8 weeks for a pond to cycle and get it's bacteria up and functioning. It can take 6-12 months for a pond to become stable. Green water is a sign of more nutrients in the water than plants can use. in a new pond these nutrients can actually be coming in from the tap water we drink. Things you can do to help at this point is add more plants, feed less, monitor your water and test regularly, and do water changes if ammonia or nitrites rise which at some point will. All new ponds do have to go through this part.

 

[Waterbug]

No real standard. Ponds are always changing. It isn't unusual for a 2.5 week old pond to be green. Impossible to guess what the brown growth/film is without seeing it in person. I wouldn't say that's unusual or a big problem assuming not a huge fish load.

Whether these things are good or bad is purely the owner's call, the kind of pond they want. If you want a very clean pond it would be a good idea to start cleaning sooner rather than later. The biggest changes in water normally happen in the first few months imo. Lots of stuff grows and dies, which piles up.

If you want nature to do more of what it does you can just let it be.

 

[Waterbug]

If you measure the nutrient levels now when the pond is green you will probably find the levels are very low, maybe even zero. This will be more true if it gets greener and greener. A pond that has been green for awhile will virtually always measure zero nutrients, or at least zero in one key major nutrient.

Should the pond then suddenly clear, as they often do, you can measure the nutrients again and you will find that the nutrient level increases, a lot. As the algae dies and decompose they release the nutrients they consumed earlier, plus you still have the pond/fish producing lots more nutrients daily.

When water clears naturally you can normally add handfuls of fertilizer and the water will stay clear.

The concept that plants remove enough nutrients to kill algae is very old. Something repeated thousands of times. But so easy to disprove.

After a pond clears the next question people often have is "how do I control string algae". The plant starving algae thing seems to only affect single cell algae for some strange reason. One of the more silly myths.