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Really big BGA problem

whoops missed that. Well the mussels are probably taking up every surface plants could attach to within a 6m depth. Anything deeper than that and you're not going to get plant life. Either way most lakes don't have the 'aquatic' plant mass to volume you'll find your your aquarium.
 
Definitely not disagreeing with you, just interesting that on one hand low nutrient levels causes algae blooms (in our tanks) and on the other hand, apparently high levels cause them in huge lakes… context is everything I guess. I do however wonder if it isn't the specific nutrient but the general pollution that's causing the bloom.
 
Some University dumped a large load of potassium phosphate (tons I think) into a lake (in Lake district ?), yes did cause algae, but relatively minor, but gone as quickly as it appeared.

Was repeated in a American lake and monster bloom ensued, eventually turning anaerobic, killing fish and lasted a while.

Cause was industrial pollution in American lakes, especially heavy metals, which was not present in the UK lakes. The pollution preferentially killed the next life form along from the algae in the food chain, thus there was nothing to eat the algae. In the UK lake, as fast as the algae reproduced, in presence of excess nutrients, it was scoffed, thus algae didn't really get a chance to take hold.

American solution (at behest of big business) was to not clean up pollution but ban phosphates in detergents :meh:

All explained in this book, as to why phosphorus wrongly get such a bad press.
http://www.amazon.co.uk/Shocking-Hi...TF8&qid=1407401081&sr=1-1&keywords=phosphorus
 
Thanks, makes more sense now and the article actually did say the alien mussels are filtering out the natural algae eaters.

Yep, very depressing how the lobbying/self interest groups override common self preservation:mad:.
 
Hi all,
Algae, phosphorus and "optical brighteners" has been a hot debate for decades. The real problem is that once you have the phosphorus it doesn't really go anywhere, and a lot of farm land (via fertilisers) and water courses (via fertilisers, optical brighteners, PIMS and sewage) now have a phosphorus load that would take thousands of years to remove, even if we stopped the supply tomorrow.

In natural ecosystems nitrogen and phosphorus are definitely the "2 horse men of the apocalypse".

Because the phosphorus cycle doesn't have an aerial phase, isolated water bodies can potentially be kept in their natural state, but it is difficult to stop diffuse pollution from agriculture.

cheers Darrel
 
What about if you fertilize soil with radioactive labelled phosphate, you get phosphate leaching but it isn't radioactive, so not the phosphate you put on the soil.

Theory here is plants are phosphate limited (ie no EI) and upon addition of extra phosphate, immediately consume it but start releasing acids into the soil to free non soluble phosphates as they have nutrition to spare, but it is these phosphates from the soil that are leached.
 
Hi all,
Ian I don't know the answer to that one, but it definitely sounds plausible.

I know that in most terrestrial semi-natural situations PO4--- acquisition by plants is actually done by the microbial symbionts, mainly from the breakdown of organically bound phosphates.

Plant roots can take up PO4--- ions directly from solution, so I assume that in agricultural situations that is what is happening. Traditionally chalk grasslands were thought to have their productivity limited by summer droughting, but the advent of phosphate rich fertilisers showed that productivity was actually limited by phosphorus availability.

I think these ones should be available and give a reasonable summary "Nutrient transfer in plant–fungal symbioses" & "Using radiometric tools to track sediment and phosphorus movement in an agricultural watershed", if they aren't and people want them, PM me and I can send them as pdf's.

cheers Darrel
 
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