In article ,
Chris Hogg wrote:

On Wed, 30 Jan 2013 17:32:44 +0000, Another John
wrote:

Looked in our pond today. Unsurprisingly, there's not much sign of life
yet ... except for the blanket weed, which is looking ominously green.

Is now a good time to use blanket-weed killer?
....
I'm not an 'organic' gardener by any means, but I draw the line at
adding algicides to my pond. Do you really have to use it? It won't do
the wildlife any good and may actually harm it. Why not just lift out
the blanket weed with a rake every few weeks (I use a sprung-tine lawn
rake, upside-down).

I agree up to a point. I do NOT like the idea of using it.

However we've been plagued for years now. I get sick of the manual
removal technique! It's tedious [with the amount of weed that we have]
and it causes a mess, because my wife insists that we leave the messy
piles around the pond "to allow the creatures to escape back into the
pond" which would be fine if she EVER returned to clean up those piles
after the creatures are gone!

It would be a fairer contest if the amount of weed were reduced
considerably (I'm not so sanguine as to think I could actually get rid
of it entirely).

Incidentally, excessive algal growth in a pond indicates too much
nitrate in the water (algae are just a primitive form of plant life
and thrive on the same nutrients as normal plants). As you haven't got
goldfish, it's not because you're feeding them, so it must be natural.
You can lower the nitrate level by adding more plants such as water
lilies, irises etc. to mop it up and compete with the algae.

Yes - I know. Have tried this -- for years. Increasing the number of
plants any more would defeat the object (or one of them): I do like to
see large areas of clear water in the pond, so we can watch the
creatures.

Cheers
John