Inversion, aeration and buffered alum to improve water quality reduces nutrients (fertilizer) needed for aquatic macrophyte (weed) growth.
| Robert L. Laing, CLEAN-FLO INTERNATIONALFertilizers cause excessive growth of aquatic weeds and algae decline as a result of nutrient reductions. All submerged aquatic plants must absorb their major food, carbon dioxide from the water column; not through the roots. The CLEAN-FLO system exhausts carbon dioxide to the atmosphere, reducing carbon dioxide to low levels. We have considerable documentation of carbon dioxide removal.In general, emergent vegetation such as lilies and cattail derive all their nutrients (except for carbon dioxide) from the roots. Although studies are limited, the studies published to our knowledge show that all other aquatic plants derive at least some of their nutrients from the water.An excellent example is Coontail, a common weed in many lakes. Coontail does not receive its nutrients from the sediment, but from the water column, having only a filamentous thread by which it attaches itself to the bottom. It can grow just as well whether the thread is attached to the bottom or not. I quote from Fassett, N.C., 1940, A Manual of Aquatic Plants, The University of Wisconsin Press, p. 210:
“COONTAIL CERATOPHYLLUM C. demersum L. Figs. 1-3. Plants entirely submerged, without roots, appearing olive-green when seen through the water; leaves in whorls, stiff, repeatedly forked, …” (etc.) Tests by Dr. Dean Martin and Ph.D. candidates Tom Cooley and Patricia Dooris at the University of South Florida showed that aeration reduces the nutrients needed for growth of a Florida weed, hydrilla. Results are more pronounced and much faster using CLEAN-FLO Lake Cleanser in combination with our inversion system. We have many other tests showing reductions in nutrients when using CLEAN-FLO natural inversion alone, documented by clients, CLEAN-FLO tests and photographs. The Orange County Pollution Control Department in Orlando, Florida tested Lake Weston. Dr. Bruce Cowell, et al. at the University of South Florida tested Brooker Lake at Lutz, Florida. Both showed an increase in Secchi disk transparency and a shift from blue-green algae to the more desirable green, yellow-green, and diatomaceous species. Similar shifts have been reported by Lorenzen of Tetra Tech, Inc., in Lafayette, California, and others. Inversion and buffered alum do not affect weed or algae growth in any way. They simply remove fertilizers that feed weeds and algae. Aeration to Control Hydrilla |
