We understand that when buying a special wow factor for your garden, such as a Jeremy Hastings Watersphere, you want to keep it looking as good as the day it was installed! We are always trying to increase our knowledge to make sure this happens, whether this is on the type of pumps we use or the treatment we can put in the water. We want to make sure you get the pleasure and aesthetic appeal from our features all year around.
Having recently attended a webinar held by OaseUK, who is one of our suppliers for our sumps, pumps and cleaning fluids, we wanted to share with you some main points we have learnt.
What is Algae and why don’t we want it?
Algae can grow in any body of water and it is key to maintain the balance of nutrients in the water to prevent algae from growing. Algae is harmless but affects the pH of the water and may damage the pumps or filters. Additionally, if there is a lot of algae growth, not only can it look unpleasant but due to the lack of oxygen, hydrogen sulphate can be produced making the water smelly. The type of algae that can grow in these conditions is blanket week (as it is known in the UK) otherwise known as string algae. The algae will also affect the UV filter if you have an open body of water beneath your water feature.
Algae grows and feeds off nutrients that are either already present in the water or nutrients that have been washed in. This can be through surface leaves, surface runoff water, birds and their faeces, or any other treatments that you may have given your plants in the flower bed. No body of water is ever the same and won’t contain the exact same nutrients. The same applies to our features. We install our water features in a number of different settings whether that is on patios, grass or in flower beds, so again the nutrients that may be washed in, will vary and therefore the amount of algae that could potentially grow also varies.
What steps can you take to prevent algae growth?
Improve water quality
Bind Nutrients
Fight the Algae
The above process is in line with the Oase ABC treatment program and they obviously recommend their own products for each stage. We have yet to discuss with our other suppliers about their products and recommendations. But, what we have learnt is that instead of jumping first to their Algo universal product, which we have previously recommended we need to be using product from step A - a product such as OptiPond which stabilises the water, or step B using PhosLess Direct to restore phosphate levels before even going towards step C of algo universal to treat the algae.
***Interesting fact*** - simply treating the algae alone is not enough, if the algae is treated, the nutrients contained in the algae simply return back to the water and algae simply grows again. It is important therefore, to not only to remove or kill the algae but the water must be treated and nutrients controlled. Additionally, if you only discard the algae not too far away, again you risk the chance of any nutrients being washed back into the open pool of water or sump reservoir.
We are forever learning in this environment and it sounds like even the experts are challenged at times with our ever changing waters and what is in them.
We hope you have found the above information useful, we certainly learnt a lot from this webinar. Do get in touch if you need any help with your water feature and maintaining the water balance.