I have read that I can use bleach in an outdoor fountain (no plants or
fish) to remove algae. Does anyone know the amount of bleach? Also,
I have a dog and want it to be safe for him as well as wildlife.

Finally, would I just add the bleach and wait for the tons of algae to
go away or do I need to clean it out first. Cleaning first is a
little difficult because the fountain is a natural one we made with
lots of rocks (as opposed to the concrete store-bought type).

Thanks.

Be careful. Can you put a cover on it? I did this years ago with a
3-barrel fountain only to find a bleached, turned to white, little frog
(dead, of course). Broke my heart.
--
Wendy* in N. California,


"People will forget what you said; people will forget what you did, but
people will never forget how you made them feel." -- Bonnie Jean Wasmund


"Rob" wrote in message
om...
I have read that I can use bleach in an outdoor fountain (no plants or
fish) to remove algae. Does anyone know the amount of bleach? Also,
I have a dog and want it to be safe for him as well as wildlife.

Finally, would I just add the bleach and wait for the tons of algae to
go away or do I need to clean it out first. Cleaning first is a
little difficult because the fountain is a natural one we made with
lots of rocks (as opposed to the concrete store-bought type).

Thanks.

Maybe one of the dog newsgroups might know
or your vet.


k30a

Hi there
Jungle makes a product called algae gone or no more algae specifically for
fountains. could give that a try have had good results in the past.
Pet guy

"Rob" wrote in message
om...
I have read that I can use bleach in an outdoor fountain (no plants or
fish) to remove algae. Does anyone know the amount of bleach? Also,
I have a dog and want it to be safe for him as well as wildlife.

Finally, would I just add the bleach and wait for the tons of algae to
go away or do I need to clean it out first. Cleaning first is a
little difficult because the fountain is a natural one we made with
lots of rocks (as opposed to the concrete store-bought type).

Thanks.

My MILs fountain probably holds 5 gallons give or take and I think she is
using a capful once a week. Her dog drinks out of it constantly.... course
he is a "white" dog. ;o) That dose is maintenance, I think you should clean
it as best you can to get the dose to work well. ~ jan

See my ponds and filter design:
http://users.owt.com/jjspond/

~Keep 'em Wet!~
Tri-Cities WA Zone 7a
To e-mail see website

Jan, you're right. When I turned a frog white, I had put in far too much
chlorine into the barrels.

I have a white 5 gallon bucket that I keep water in for watering plants.
It's in the full sun and gets algae. When the algae gets too much to look
at I just put in a few drops and the algae goes away.

City drinking water has chlorine in it and no harm. Just find the amount
that keeps algae off and doesn't make the water smell too strong of
chlorine. You might want to pressure wash with a garden hose first to
remove some of the stronger algae. Remembering from my tank days, chlorine
will dissipate after 48 hours.

--
Wendy* in N. California,

"When you lose, don't lose the lesson." - Dalai Lama


"~ jan JJsPond.us" wrote in message
...
My MILs fountain probably holds 5 gallons give or take and I think she is
using a capful once a week. Her dog drinks out of it constantly.... course
he is a "white" dog. ;o) That dose is maintenance, I think you should
clean
it as best you can to get the dose to work well. ~ jan

See my ponds and filter design:
http://users.owt.com/jjspond/

~Keep 'em Wet!~
Tri-Cities WA Zone 7a
To e-mail see website

"Rob" wrote in message
om...
I have read that I can use bleach in an outdoor fountain (no plants or
fish) to remove algae. Does anyone know the amount of bleach? Also,
I have a dog and want it to be safe for him as well as wildlife.

Finally, would I just add the bleach and wait for the tons of algae to
go away or do I need to clean it out first. Cleaning first is a
little difficult because the fountain is a natural one we made with
lots of rocks (as opposed to the concrete store-bought type).

I'd say google up some info on pool care. Pools need to have a stable amount
of chlorine (or substitute) to keep the water clear of algae, but safe for
eyes and skin, and the occasional gallon you drink every time you go in a
pool. *laugh* Bleach is essentially, chlorine, so I bet the same rules
apply.

BV.

"Wendy Kelly Budd" wrote in message ...
Jan, you're right. When I turned a frog white, I had put in far too much
chlorine into the barrels.

I have a white 5 gallon bucket that I keep water in for watering plants.
It's in the full sun and gets algae. When the algae gets too much to look
at I just put in a few drops and the algae goes away.

City drinking water has chlorine in it and no harm. Just find the amount
that keeps algae off and doesn't make the water smell too strong of
chlorine. You might want to pressure wash with a garden hose first to
remove some of the stronger algae. Remembering from my tank days, chlorine
will dissipate after 48 hours.

When chlorine has evaporated it leaves salts behind. To repeatedly add
chlorine to one's soils does leave a residue that increases with time,
until eventually the soil could be harmed.

There is nothing harmless about adding chlorine to water, it's merely
that the bacterial agents & amoebas & funguses & sundry microbes that
we would be exposed to without the city treating the water would be
vastly more harmful. This is for human & animal exposures; the same
relative risk to benefit factor falls more to the risk side in the
garden which is not susceptible to the waterborne diseases that we
mammals are. To add even more chlorine to tap water after it reaches
us, then put it on the garden, seems to me a bad idea. Since the
garden is not at risk of typhoid or cholora & suchlike, to expose the
garden to further salts unecessarily can't help the garden, & might
hurt.

Here are some of the health risks to chlorinated water -- the reason
so many either filter their water with EPA approved filters, or buy
purer water in five gallon containers for the water cooler:

1) Chlorine kills soil microbes without which plants cannot access
nutrients in the soil.

2) Binds with other chemicals in the soil creating toxins with unknown
risk factors. Some of the risk factors that ARE known are pretty
extreme. Bonded chemicals ir Chlorination Byproducts in tapwater are
associated with birth defects from drinking it while pregnant, & with
miscarriages. Infant neural tube defects DOUBLE from drinking
chlorinated water. Miscarriages rise to 15.7% in women who drink
tapwater with chlorinatation byproduct, from the 9.5% for women who do
not drink tapwater.

3) EPA estunates that chlorinated tapewater causes 9,300 cases of
bladder cancer nationwide each year. There are studies that show a
probable link to breast cancer & brain cancer as well, but bladder
cancer is fairly well documented. It is not the chlorine per se but as
with birth defects it is the chlorination byproducts. Cities monitor
the byproducts & adjust treatment methods accordingly, something that
is circumvented by further chlorination at home. Unfortunately
whenever studies are undertaken on the chlorination byproducts, it
turns out a great many communities don't have updated resources to
monitor & correct this properly, so that millions are put at increased
risk. One broad assessment discovered that in & around Philadelphia,
Washington DC, San Francisco, Pittsburgh, & Newark NJ, well over
one-thousand water systems had dangerous contaminant levels from
chlorination byproducts.

4) Chlorination is frequently overused in order to avoid healthy farm
practices & proper waste disposal. The idea has become "we'll
chlorinate this sess pool of cowshit then it'll be safe to let it run
off into the nearest lake or river come the next rain." This puts
harmful CPBs back into the watersheds from which we obtain our
drinking water with increasing levels of poorly monitored CPBs. All
too often the cheapness of "let's zap it with chlorine" induces
disposal behavior that kills wildlife & people. See CONSIDER THE
SOURCE: FARM RUNOFF, CHLORINATION, AND HUMAN HEALTH published by the
Environmental Working Group, Washington, D.C.)

5) As tropical fish hobbyists have long known, chlorine in tap water
kills fish. It kills amphibians much more readily, even in amounts
that would seem inconsequential, though consequential enough to kill
you if you're a frog or salamander.

6) If frogs & salamanders don't seem canary-in-the-coal-mine enough
for you, consider that death can occur in kidney dialysis patients who
are susceptible chloramine-induced hemolytic anemia either by drinking
tapwater with chloramine in it, or from being hooked up to dialysis
equipment that has been cleaned with treated water. Most chlorinated
water does not include chloramine, but enough do that hospitals have
learned to be on-guard. Some municipalities switch to chloramine
treatment as a method of lowering other CPB components when these have
built up to dangerous levels due to chlorination -- hospitals have to
be warned when this occurs.

7) There are better methods of treatment, but not cheaper ones.
Ozonization is being used in some cities now, to avoid the cancer risk
& other problems with adding chlorine to the water. Because the
chlorine manufacturers are having their customer base eroded, they
have begun a world-wide propoganda campaign to make the EPA look
ignorant for setting safe maximum exposures too low for the chlorine
sales forces to increase their sales, & to make all ecology-minded
people look like commy pinko radicals. The primary argument "for" is
a good one, but the propoganda wants to mute your awareness of the
"against" lest the public demand one of the better but more costly
methods of insuring safer water.

8) Chlorinated water is associated with hardening of the arteries.

9) Chlorinated water destroys proteins in the body.

10) Asthma & allergy sufferers are more prone to respiratory distress
when drinking chlorinated water.

11) Besides ADDING cancer causing agents to water by means of CPBs,
chlorine also simply doesn't remove the vast majority of cancer
causing agents that may already be in the water. It's great for
getting rid of the bacteria, but it is NOT the end-all municipalities
have made of it, so further reason to move on to the next level of
technology that will leave the chlorine manufacturers increasingly
peevish. Many of the contaminants that remain in the water once
they've reached it include many common garden chemicals. We're just
killin' ourselves.

12) some of the specific CPBs (alternatively called DPBs, Disinfectant
Byproducts) are chloroform, bromodichloromethane,
dibromochloromethane, bromoform, dichloroacetic acid & trichloroacetic
acid -- there are many other possible CPB contaminants.

13) Tapwater is dangerous to people with compromised immune systems.

14) The EPA maximums can be exceeded if the annual exposure averages
out to less. Some municipalities issue public warnings not to water
gardens when chlorine levels have been raised to take care of a
specific bacterial problem that arose in the system. More
municipalties should issue such warnings, but fail to do so for fear
of setting off too many alarms in the public consciousness.

And so on.

I'm glad water is chlorinated. I'm not terribly concerned that there
may be a half-million miscarriages each year because of chlorinated
water because there's already too many people. But I do hope for the
safety of the people who are actually here & alive. I do believe
chlorinated water has saved millions who would otherwise have died of
waterborne diseases, but I would also have some concern for the
thousands remaining who are harmed by CBPs in chlorinated water, so do
recommend home filtering, avoiding the use of chlorine products in the
home, & would hope eventually a vaster number of municipalities will
look to ozonification & other safer methods of delivering water safely
to citizens.

But even if we decide to trust our municipalities are getting it
right, & monitoring even the CBPs correctly, we'll be undoing their
good work by any additional home chlorination.

Whether "Garden Water Filters" such as AquaMate are all that helpful,
I don't know, but many people knowing the risks are real for human,
wildlife, & plantlife, are using such products. I just water my lawn
from the tap & hope for the best, but I sure wouldn't ADD chlorine to
the brew myself.

It is also puzzling to me that people can take such a strong dislike
to algae. Floating algae maybe, it ruins visibility, but algae is not
the devil that chemicals can be.

-paghat the ratgirl

A garden tank sprayer with water and bleach mix will clean the rocks.
I would use swimming pool slow dissolving tablets in a floating
dispenser after that. Protect your eyes and wear clothes you can throw
away when spraying the bleach mixture. If you have sensitive skin
cover up and wear gloves.
I don't think you can use algaecide because it foams like soap.
I would check with a local pool or spa supply they might have a non
chlorine product that will not have the smell.
"Rob" wrote in message
om...
I have read that I can use bleach in an outdoor fountain (no plants
or
fish) to remove algae. Does anyone know the amount of bleach?
Also,
I have a dog and want it to be safe for him as well as wildlife.

Finally, would I just add the bleach and wait for the tons of algae
to
go away or do I need to clean it out first. Cleaning first is a
little difficult because the fountain is a natural one we made with
lots of rocks (as opposed to the concrete store-bought type).

Thanks.

The original poster wanted to add chlorine to a fountain. No pregnant moms
will drink from that water.
--
Wendy* in N. California,

"Love and compassion are necessities, not luxuries. Without them humanity
cannot survive.My religion is very simple. My religion is kindness." Dalai
Lama


"paghat" wrote in message
m...
"Wendy Kelly Budd" wrote in message
...
Jan, you're right. When I turned a frog white, I had put in far too
much
chlorine into the barrels.

I have a white 5 gallon bucket that I keep water in for watering plants.
It's in the full sun and gets algae. When the algae gets too much to
look
at I just put in a few drops and the algae goes away.

City drinking water has chlorine in it and no harm. Just find the
amount
that keeps algae off and doesn't make the water smell too strong of
chlorine. You might want to pressure wash with a garden hose first to
remove some of the stronger algae. Remembering from my tank days,
chlorine
will dissipate after 48 hours.

When chlorine has evaporated it leaves salts behind. To repeatedly add
chlorine to one's soils does leave a residue that increases with time,
until eventually the soil could be harmed.

There is nothing harmless about adding chlorine to water, it's merely
that the bacterial agents & amoebas & funguses & sundry microbes that
we would be exposed to without the city treating the water would be
vastly more harmful. This is for human & animal exposures; the same
relative risk to benefit factor falls more to the risk side in the
garden which is not susceptible to the waterborne diseases that we
mammals are. To add even more chlorine to tap water after it reaches
us, then put it on the garden, seems to me a bad idea. Since the
garden is not at risk of typhoid or cholora & suchlike, to expose the
garden to further salts unecessarily can't help the garden, & might
hurt.

Here are some of the health risks to chlorinated water -- the reason
so many either filter their water with EPA approved filters, or buy
purer water in five gallon containers for the water cooler:

1) Chlorine kills soil microbes without which plants cannot access
nutrients in the soil.

2) Binds with other chemicals in the soil creating toxins with unknown
risk factors. Some of the risk factors that ARE known are pretty
extreme. Bonded chemicals ir Chlorination Byproducts in tapwater are
associated with birth defects from drinking it while pregnant, & with
miscarriages. Infant neural tube defects DOUBLE from drinking
chlorinated water. Miscarriages rise to 15.7% in women who drink
tapwater with chlorinatation byproduct, from the 9.5% for women who do
not drink tapwater.

3) EPA estunates that chlorinated tapewater causes 9,300 cases of
bladder cancer nationwide each year. There are studies that show a
probable link to breast cancer & brain cancer as well, but bladder
cancer is fairly well documented. It is not the chlorine per se but as
with birth defects it is the chlorination byproducts. Cities monitor
the byproducts & adjust treatment methods accordingly, something that
is circumvented by further chlorination at home. Unfortunately
whenever studies are undertaken on the chlorination byproducts, it
turns out a great many communities don't have updated resources to
monitor & correct this properly, so that millions are put at increased
risk. One broad assessment discovered that in & around Philadelphia,
Washington DC, San Francisco, Pittsburgh, & Newark NJ, well over
one-thousand water systems had dangerous contaminant levels from
chlorination byproducts.

4) Chlorination is frequently overused in order to avoid healthy farm
practices & proper waste disposal. The idea has become "we'll
chlorinate this sess pool of cowshit then it'll be safe to let it run
off into the nearest lake or river come the next rain." This puts
harmful CPBs back into the watersheds from which we obtain our
drinking water with increasing levels of poorly monitored CPBs. All
too often the cheapness of "let's zap it with chlorine" induces
disposal behavior that kills wildlife & people. See CONSIDER THE
SOURCE: FARM RUNOFF, CHLORINATION, AND HUMAN HEALTH published by the
Environmental Working Group, Washington, D.C.)

5) As tropical fish hobbyists have long known, chlorine in tap water
kills fish. It kills amphibians much more readily, even in amounts
that would seem inconsequential, though consequential enough to kill
you if you're a frog or salamander.

6) If frogs & salamanders don't seem canary-in-the-coal-mine enough
for you, consider that death can occur in kidney dialysis patients who
are susceptible chloramine-induced hemolytic anemia either by drinking
tapwater with chloramine in it, or from being hooked up to dialysis
equipment that has been cleaned with treated water. Most chlorinated
water does not include chloramine, but enough do that hospitals have
learned to be on-guard. Some municipalities switch to chloramine
treatment as a method of lowering other CPB components when these have
built up to dangerous levels due to chlorination -- hospitals have to
be warned when this occurs.

7) There are better methods of treatment, but not cheaper ones.
Ozonization is being used in some cities now, to avoid the cancer risk
& other problems with adding chlorine to the water. Because the
chlorine manufacturers are having their customer base eroded, they
have begun a world-wide propoganda campaign to make the EPA look
ignorant for setting safe maximum exposures too low for the chlorine
sales forces to increase their sales, & to make all ecology-minded
people look like commy pinko radicals. The primary argument "for" is
a good one, but the propoganda wants to mute your awareness of the
"against" lest the public demand one of the better but more costly
methods of insuring safer water.

8) Chlorinated water is associated with hardening of the arteries.

9) Chlorinated water destroys proteins in the body.

10) Asthma & allergy sufferers are more prone to respiratory distress
when drinking chlorinated water.

11) Besides ADDING cancer causing agents to water by means of CPBs,
chlorine also simply doesn't remove the vast majority of cancer
causing agents that may already be in the water. It's great for
getting rid of the bacteria, but it is NOT the end-all municipalities
have made of it, so further reason to move on to the next level of
technology that will leave the chlorine manufacturers increasingly
peevish. Many of the contaminants that remain in the water once
they've reached it include many common garden chemicals. We're just
killin' ourselves.

12) some of the specific CPBs (alternatively called DPBs, Disinfectant
Byproducts) are chloroform, bromodichloromethane,
dibromochloromethane, bromoform, dichloroacetic acid & trichloroacetic
acid -- there are many other possible CPB contaminants.

13) Tapwater is dangerous to people with compromised immune systems.

14) The EPA maximums can be exceeded if the annual exposure averages
out to less. Some municipalities issue public warnings not to water
gardens when chlorine levels have been raised to take care of a
specific bacterial problem that arose in the system. More
municipalties should issue such warnings, but fail to do so for fear
of setting off too many alarms in the public consciousness.

And so on.

I'm glad water is chlorinated. I'm not terribly concerned that there
may be a half-million miscarriages each year because of chlorinated
water because there's already too many people. But I do hope for the
safety of the people who are actually here & alive. I do believe
chlorinated water has saved millions who would otherwise have died of
waterborne diseases, but I would also have some concern for the
thousands remaining who are harmed by CBPs in chlorinated water, so do
recommend home filtering, avoiding the use of chlorine products in the
home, & would hope eventually a vaster number of municipalities will
look to ozonification & other safer methods of delivering water safely
to citizens.

But even if we decide to trust our municipalities are getting it
right, & monitoring even the CBPs correctly, we'll be undoing their
good work by any additional home chlorination.

Whether "Garden Water Filters" such as AquaMate are all that helpful,
I don't know, but many people knowing the risks are real for human,
wildlife, & plantlife, are using such products. I just water my lawn
from the tap & hope for the best, but I sure wouldn't ADD chlorine to
the brew myself.

It is also puzzling to me that people can take such a strong dislike
to algae. Floating algae maybe, it ruins visibility, but algae is not
the devil that chemicals can be.

-paghat the ratgirl

(paghat) wrote in
m:

When chlorine has evaporated it leaves salts behind. To repeatedly add
chlorine to one's soils does leave a residue that increases with time,
until eventually the soil could be harmed.

It's not the chlorine evaporating that's the problem. The problem is
whatever crap that is already in the water becomes chlorinated crap, which
is probably the residue you are talking about. Any excess free chlorine
escapes into the air eventually. Don't know how chloramines (if your city
uses them) differs.

Here are some of the health risks to chlorinated water -- the reason
so many either filter their water with EPA approved filters, or buy
purer water in five gallon containers for the water cooler:

Personally, I filter my water because of any heavy metal or other not
necessarily chlorine crap in it.

1) Chlorine kills soil microbes without which plants cannot access
nutrients in the soil.

2) Binds with other chemicals in the soil creating toxins with unknown
risk factors. Some of the risk factors that ARE known are pretty
extreme. Bonded chemicals ir Chlorination Byproducts in tapwater are
associated with birth defects from drinking it while pregnant, & with
miscarriages. Infant neural tube defects DOUBLE from drinking
chlorinated water. Miscarriages rise to 15.7% in women who drink
tapwater with chlorinatation byproduct, from the 9.5% for women who do
not drink tapwater.

The city of Chesapeake Virginia was sued due to something in the water that
allegedly caused a lot of miscarriages. I believe it was excess chlorine
that reacted with organic crud already in the water to form
trihalomethanes. It's not something you want in your kool-aid.

5) As tropical fish hobbyists have long known, chlorine in tap water
kills fish. It kills amphibians much more readily, even in amounts
that would seem inconsequential, though consequential enough to kill
you if you're a frog or salamander.

It's been a long time since I've had fish, but if you leave the water out
in the open for a like a day or so, the chlorine dissipates enough for the
fish to tolerate it. That might be for regular fish, not necessarily
tropical. It's bad for fish and amphibians because they use the dissolved
oxygen in water for respiration. When there is chlorine in the water,
that's tantamount to forcing them to breath chlorine.

12) some of the specific CPBs (alternatively called DPBs, Disinfectant
Byproducts) are chloroform, bromodichloromethane,
dibromochloromethane, bromoform, dichloroacetic acid & trichloroacetic
acid -- there are many other possible CPB contaminants.

The first four, going by name, are trihalomethanes (THMs).

But even if we decide to trust our municipalities are getting it
right, & monitoring even the CBPs correctly, we'll be undoing their
good work by any additional home chlorination.

I don't think it's too bad to clean out the algae in a fountain with the
ocassional bleaching, but to systematically home chlorinate the drinking
water, that's not something I would do. If algae are a problem, there's
probably organic matter in contact with water somewhere. Find out where
they are getting their nitrogen and stop it. (of course if they've
developed a symbiotic relationship with nitrogen fixing bacteria, then you
are screwed, sorry).

Even if the water is not for drinking, the chlorinated by-products are
going to end up some where.

Whether "Garden Water Filters" such as AquaMate are all that helpful,
I don't know, but many people knowing the risks are real for human,
wildlife, & plantlife, are using such products. I just water my lawn
from the tap & hope for the best, but I sure wouldn't ADD chlorine to
the brew myself.

It is also puzzling to me that people can take such a strong dislike
to algae. Floating algae maybe, it ruins visibility, but algae is not
the devil that chemicals can be.

Because algae is wet and slimy, like mucal nasal discharges, only more
green, whereas chemicals are 'pure', 'refined' and quite sanitary in their
nice clean delivery containers.

Halogenically yours,

-- Salty

I have regularly used either bleach or pool chlorine in my fountain - it
holds about 5 - 10 gals of water and I add ~ 1 capful per week or as needed
and fountain water stays clear - birds still drink from it and haven't seen
any dead ones yet :
Gale :~)


" I have read that I can use bleach in an outdoor fountain (no plants or
fish) to remove algae. Does anyone know the amount of bleach? Also,
I have a dog and want it to be safe for him as well as wildlife.

Finally, would I just add the bleach and wait for the tons of algae to
go away or do I need to clean it out first. Cleaning first is a
little difficult because the fountain is a natural one we made with
lots of rocks (as opposed to the concrete store-bought type).

Thanks.

paghat wrote:

...1) Chlorine kills soil microbes without which plants cannot access
nutrients in the soil.

...5) As tropical fish hobbyists have long known, chlorine in tap water
kills fish...

...7) There are better methods of treatment, but not cheaper ones...

Hydrogen peroxide can be used. It's probably not cheaper than chlorine,
but it's not generally considered as an option. At concentrations that
kill algae, it may also have an effect on the microbes. Fish can survive
in moderate hydrogen peroxide concentrations (not sure about tropical
fish). Also, the peroxide does not dissipate in the same way as
chlorine. The peroxide is removed through oxidation reactions which is
how it kills things, otherwise it's fairly stable. The by-product of the
oxidation is water.

Another alternative is oxygenation. I have heard that farm ponds with
algae problems can be treated by simply bubbling air through the water.
I have not tried this, so it's hearsay.

I think the original post was about algae in a water bucket. If a
somewhat larger water storage system was used, fish might be an option
to keep the algae down. Once again, it may not be cheaper, and there's a
maintenance issue involving feeding the fish and storing them over the
winter.





...It is also puzzling to me that people can take such a strong dislike
to algae. Floating algae maybe, it ruins visibility, but algae is not
the devil that chemicals can be.

If you're watering through a drip system, algae can clog the emitters.
If your water barrel has a lot of organic solids in it (including algae)
it can breed mosquitoes unless it's covered. Otherwise, the algae is
strictly a cosmetic problem. For drip systems, the problem can be solved
through filtration rather than algicide, although filter maintenance is
then an issue.