Pond scum… a smelly situation
A look at what’s floating in ponds, lakes and lagoons, and what RYDALL WO can do to help.
“I’m pond scum. Well, lower actually. I’m like the fungus that feeds on pond scum.”
– excerpt from My Best Friend’s Wedding (1997)
Whether you are referring to a person or the stuff floating in a body of water, pond scum has
a negative connotation. But what is it and why does it look and smell nasty?
The gradual decomposition of organic matter as it is deposited in bodies of water causes pollution. The amount of pollution a given body of water can sustain is determined by the amount of oxygen it contains. It is this oxygen that allows naturally occurring microorganisms to oxidize the organic matter completing its decomposition and transforming it into carbon dioxide and products such as lignin and humin, which settle harmlessly as sediment.
When the water is so stagnant that the microorganisms use up all of the available oxygen, serious pollution occurs. This situation is worsened by the increased mortality of fish and other water life, which cannot survive under these conditions.
In the final stages of pollution, the sulfide formed due to the lack of oxygen, develops into a state of extremely bad odor which is toxic to most living organisms.
Lakes, ponds and lagoons (both natural and artificial) usually have polluted zones near the bottom, where free sulfide is present. Under normal circumstances, there is another layer just above this zone, which contains sulfide oxidizing bacteria, disposing of the sulfide.
The depth of this particular layer usually depends on how clear the water is, since many sulfide oxidizing bacteria are photo-autotroph, they require light in order to grow.
Above this second layer, fish, algae and plankton grow, and the whole body of water is a stable system with the sulfur cycle progressing quietly in its lower reaches
Problems typically occur when artificial pollution such as sewage or industrial wastes are fed into bodies of water overwhelming the natural balance, which causes the anaerobic zone to spread until it comprises the whole water system.
RYDALL WO to the rescue
With the use of RYDALL WO Water Optimizer, these catastrophic conditions can be halted and corrected. RYDALL WO’s ion binding capacity, in tandem with the product’s cleansing and stimulating attributes, establishes the correct conditions to restore the natural balance.
Introducing RYDALL WO into the system increases the amount of dissolved oxygen in the lake, pond, or lagoon, making the water clearer, therefore allowing more light to flow into the lower layers.
Additionally, RYDALL WO promotes the digestion of the solids and stimulates the sulfide oxidizing bacteria. With the combination of these factors the bacteria become more efficient, the sulfur cycle is restored and the natural balance returns to the body of water.
RYDALL WO also eliminates odors and toxicity further by restricting the growth of the toxic sulfide produced by the sulfate reducing bacteria.
As water pollution is a continuous problem, any body of water can be continually treated with RYDALL WO; however, once the initial clean-up is finished, and the body of water is stabilized, a small maintenance dose of RYDALL WO will be sufficient to maintain the body of water in optimal condition.
RYDALL WO & golf courses
When applied in the regular irrigation protocols, RYDALL WO Water Optimizer will:
- Eliminate the black plug layers.
- Reduce the need of dethatching.
- Clean the soil of the chemical crust.
- Reduce the need of fertilizers.
- Reduce water consumption.
- Improve the quality of the turf grass, due to increased bioactivity of the natural bacteria, which convert the thatch layer to compost.
RYDALL WO tackles water hazard on 13th hole
A Virginia golf course was experiencing a strong stench emanating from a multi-tiered pond that surrounded the normally picturesque par 3, 13th hole. The murky pond and unpleasant odor, which stemmed from rotting algae and putrid organic matter, became a distraction to golfers, as well as staff.
- 2 1/2 gallons of RYDALL WO were sprayed over the top-level of the pond (water from the top level drains into the lower ponds) four times over a period of 30 days
- 24 hours after the first application, the repugnant odor was completely gone and the staff even saw an improvement in the clarity of the water!
- After all four applications, more than 80% of the algae disappeared and water clarity improved from 3 inches to 4 feet!
FOOD & BEVERAGE, meet RYDLYME & RYDALL
Where there’s water, there’s RYDLYME Biodegradable Descaler…
• evaporative condensers • air compressors
• cooling towers • heat exchangers
• chillers • dehumidification systems
• boilers • and more!
Where there’s wastewater, there’s RYDALL WO Water Optimizer…
• pre-treatment • sludge tanks/lagoons
Where there’s odor, there’s RYDALL OE Odor Eliminator…
• grease interceptors • garbage/waste receptacles
• composting operations • wash down areas
Where there’s grease, dirt and grime, there’s RYDALL MP Multi Purpose Degreaser and RYDALL CC Coil Cleaner…
• evaporator coils • finned air cooling/heating equipment
• work stations/areas/surfaces • and more!
All our products are biodegradable, safe and non-toxic. RYDLYME, RYDALL MP and RYDALL CC are NSF-certified. RYDLYME is also NSF/ANSI Standard 60-certified as a cleaner for potable water systems.
No need to clean ‘God’s bathtub’
Imagine a lake that’s never been affected by climate change or any other man-made influences. Australian scientists say they have found just that—a remote lake whose crystal-clear waters seem to be in the same chemical state as they were about 7,500 years ago.
“It’s like God’s bathtub,” Dr. Cameron Barr told the Australian Associated Press of the body of water now named Blue Lake. “It is beautiful. It is absolutely beautiful.”
Barr and his team of researchers from the University of Adelaide say the lake is so pure that you can see more than 30 feet below the surface to its bottom.
“It appears that Blue Lake has been an important climate ‘refuge’ for the freshwater biota of the region, and is in the same condition now as it was 7,500 years ago,” Barr told the Australian Broadcasting Corporation.
Barr, who published his findings in the current issue of Freshwater Biology, said it’s the only such lake of its kind known to be in Australia.
To reach its conclusion, the team studied the lake’s water quality, fossil pollen and algae, which team members then compared with photos taken of nearby areas on the island over the past 117 years.
Several other nearby former lakes have dried up over the past 40 years due to climate change, Barr noted. In fact, Barr’s team was on North Stradbroke to study the effects of those former bodies of water when his team stumbled across the anomaly that is Blue Lake.
The lake’s water has remained unchanged, said Barr, because its waters drain into a nearby swamp and are replaced by an aquifer every 35 days or so.
“Because it’s constantly being updated it doesn’t suffer from the vagaries of the climate in so far as it doesn’t evaporate and become more saline,” Barr told the Australian Broadcasting Corporation. “It doesn’t fill up and become fresher. It just remains constant.”
Barr said something as small as sunscreen samples from tourists could alter the lake’s chemistry. The last thing we want to do is leave a ring around God’s bathtub.
Original article by By Eric Pfeiffer, Yahoo! News
What’s in the box??
To address an issue of dog owners not picking up after their four-legged loved ones at a dog park, a small town in Spain has decided to mail the discarded dog excrement back to the offending owners.
The Telegraph reports that the town council of Brunete, located about 20 miles from Madrid, is cracking down on the disrespectful dog owners. Volunteers approach dog owners who leave behind their pet’s meadow nuggets and strike up a conversation to find out the name of the dog in order to identify the owner from the registered pet database held in the town hall.
Once identified, the doo-doo is scooped up, placed in a box labeled with the town hall’s insignia and “Lost Property” and then delivered to the owner. After approximately 150 delivered boxes of canine logs, reports of abandoned surprises have declined by 70%.
Original article by The Telegraph