(Area) Aquatic vegetation is becoming more and more prevalent in area ponds.
Whether you want them to or not, plants are growing in the water. DNR Fisheries Supervisor Chris Larson explains, “It seems like recently I’ve been getting quite a few phone calls from pond owners that are having issues with too many weeds in their pond. I call them them plants, but most people call them weeds. Also the algae that’s been growing gets matted up this time of your and forms on top of the vegetation so you get that mossy, ugly look.”
Larson says there are a number of things you can do about it. “One of them is to live with it, because rooted aquatic vegetation is good for water quality. If you don’t have rooted aquatic vegetation then you are going to grow algae and that makes the lake or pond like pea green soup and most people don’t like that either. You can manage it either mechanically where you rake it off the top or cut the plants away. That’s a lot of work, but there are also some herbicide treatments that can be applied.”
You must be cautious not to kill off everything at once. “If you treat the whole pond and kill all the vegetation or the majority of it, all that dying vegetation is going to be broken down by bacteria. Bacteria uses algae as it consumes the breakdown of those plants and can suck the oxygen out of the pond so you don’t want to do that either. If at any time you need some advice on managing your pond you can give us a call at our office and talk to any of our fisheries personnel. They are all well versed on managing small ponds in Iowa.”
The DNR Office in Lewis can be reached at 712-769-2587. There are also resources available on their website at IowaDNR.gov.
