The Best Way to Oxygenate a Big Pond

Use floating plants among other methods to increase the oxygen in your pond water.

Large ponds can lose oxygen at a dangerous rate to fish contained within due to a number of factors including heat, direct sunlight and still waters. To avoid this, it’s necessary to increase the oxygen content of your pond. The larger the pond, the more difficult it is to affect the oxygen it contains. With a few applied steps, however, you can oxygenate your big pond in a way that provides for instant oxygen relief for your fish, along with a lasting increase in the oxygen level.

Things You'll Need

• Net
• Boat
• Oxygenating plants
• Trees
• Aerators

Instructions

1. Remove waste items from the pond with a net. Skim the surface of the pond with the net. Cast the net over the pond from the shore and pull it toward you to remove decaying leaves or other debris. If the pond is too large to skim the entire surface from the shore, then use a boat to drag the net behind you gathering up debris. Make certain you use a net with floaters attached to avoid its sinking beneath the surface.

2. Add oxygenating plants to the pond to remove carbon dioxide and increase the oxygen level. Use a combination of floating and submerged plants to spread the oxygen. The floating plants also provide shade to the pond, cooling off the water so that it will hold the oxygen content longer.

3. Increase the shade along the shore by planting overhanging shade trees. As with the floating plants, the shade provided by the trees will cool off the pond, increasing the water’s ability to retain oxygen.

4. Sink several air pumps below the surface of the water to aerate the pond directly. Not only will the pumps provide oxygen with the air, the action of the bubbles will break the surface of the water, which releases gas from the pond while the water movement adds still more oxygen. Locate the aerators where they will enhance natural water circulation patterns, such as the edges of rectangular ponds or in the center of round ones. The number of aerators to use or the length of aeration necessary varies by pond size and fish concentration. For a normal fishing pond, use an aerator with a rating of about 1 hp per acre three hours daily, with more concentrated fishing sites or fish farms needing about 1.5 to 2 hp per acre six hours a day.

References

• Foster & Smith Aquatics: How to Maintain Proper Pond Oxygen Content
• Cooperative Extension in Pennsylvania: Pond Home Study Course Lesson 2 Pond Maintenance
• The Fish Site: Pond Aeration