Any suggestions on how to clean out a pond full of weed? My brother in law just bought a place and the pond on it is packed with lily pads and what I think is hydrilla.

Carp for the hydrilla, but i dont know if they can do anyhting about the lilly pads. There are additives to do it also.

In my experience, hydrilla is kind of unusual in ponds...someone had to put it there...but if it is hydrilla, then grass carp will clean it out for you. They won't do much to the lillies, especially with hydrilla, which is a preferrred food, present.

I don't like using chemicals on my ponds, but on occasion have used REWARD for some problem weeds. It would take out the lillies, but we are heading into a dangerous time for using chemicals...too much decaying plants will take the DO out of the water and can cause a fish kill...so be very careful if you use any chemicals and only do a portion of the pond at any given time.

Some weeds are good, IMO, in a pond and the trick is finding the right balance.

How big is the pond and what kind of fish are currently in it? You have several options:

-First off, you need to find out WHAT species of vegetation you really have in your pond.

-If you do get approved for grass carp, how many would you need and they may take a while to rid enough hydrilla so you can fish it.

-If you don't get the grass carp, you can use chemicals and spray the hydrilla, but only spray 1/4 of your pond every 10-14 days, otherwise you'll get a die-off of the existing fish.

-They/grass carp will not eat the lily pads or American Lotus, and you will have to treat the pond with chemicals on that one.

-If you don't want to use chemicals, you can do manual removal of the vegetation, but it is time consuming and labor intensive.

-Once you remove as much vegtation as possible, you may want to add a 'shade' to your water to reduce the sunlight which will reduce vegetation growth.

-Or last, but not least, you can start over completely by rotenoning your pond, killing both weeds and fish and starting over and keeping a management plan on your fishery.

Just a suggestion you might want to consider...

aggiee feed store sells a product called karmax or carmex ..it works .

note>> forgot it wont harm ur fish

Karmax is possibly the worst, most dangerous product you can use in a pond...don't believe me just ask any of the A&M fisheries biologists such as Dr. Mike Masser.

Many times fisheries biologists will have different views of various products and pond treatments...but when it comes to Karmax they all speak with one voice...DO NOT USE IT IN YOUR POND.

It is highly toxic, very long lasting, extremely carcinogenic, and very expensive and dangerous to remediate.

Read the data sheets, check with any fisheries biologists and whatever you do, don't touch this stuff!!!

http://msds.chem.ox.ac.uk/DI/diuron.html

HUUU was not aware of that but it worked fine on my partners small lake ,,used it 1 time but thats been mabe 8-10 yrs ago mabe longer. put 2000 fingerlings prior to that.it holds some nice footballs to this day.matter of fact he has 14.8 florida(PET) he can hand feed..still apPreciate the info meadowlark i will have to let him know about that.

At one time Karmax was recommended. No longer.

Check out this link: http://texaslakesandponds.com/weedidentification.html. Identify your vegetation and then look at all of the options. There are chemicals (use with care per breambuster's post) and tools (effective on lily pads and selective) that will do the job.