Dairy Pond Treatment in Australia

I arrived at this farm after an inquiry from the son of the owner. He said they were having all sorts of issues with their pond, including the delivery pipe choking up many times. I could not even see where it was emptying into the pond as it was buried by inches of crusty top. The smell was really strong and rotten. The surface was quite solid and did not move much when pushed.

The client had sprayed the grass on the surface of the pond to give me a much better idea of the overall size of the pond. He could not tell me how deep it was but a prod with a 2” pipe showed it had a huge load of sludge and it did not go in very far.

The crust was thick, hard and had a solid grass growth almost all over. It was probably one of the worst cases I have seen and they were considering digging another pond and letting this one dry up and get filled in. He asked if I thought I could fix it and I must say I was unsure of how fast or how far we could go as no one knew what was in there as it had not been cleaned for 3 years. The cost of Mechanical clean out was too much for the client to absorb but he agreed to trial BioForce after hearing it came with our 100% money back guarantee.

To start the treatment we broke into the pond on the outside edge in 8 places and added 50 litres of Bio-force divided into buckets of water. We also started adding it at the shed at the rate of 1 litre per 200 cows per day, washed down in the wash water, to try and get some activity underway.

Within 1 week some changes were obvious and there had been a little rain as well which helped moisten things a bit. The edges were showing a good green colour on new young grass and some small wet areas were becoming visible.

It was like there was an island in the middle separating from the edge.

After 4 weeks it was beginning to show big holes and the surface of the crust was moving like it was very soft. Big pieces of it were disappearing and more holes were opening up all the time. There were areas of foam showing that there was gas being generated with the biological activity happening in the pond.

As this was a really heavily loaded pond and he was milking 260 cows it was a slow job due to the amount of sludge build-up as well as the new waste. By 8 weeks we had almost a completely liquid pond and there was almost no crust visible. The farm needed irrigation water so some was pumped from the pond and this is what I found when I returned. There had been some serious rain as well since it was pumped down but the pond had no smell, there was a small amount of old dying grass just visible in the middle.

He continued to dose at 1 litre per 200 cows and used the pond as irrigation water. His irrigated paddocks were showing a huge change in the health of the grass and the increase in dry matter was noticeable. It was interesting that after 6 months he told me he did not realise just how big the pond was or even how deep it was after the sludge had been digested. In the past he had given up trying to use the pond for irrigation as it was too heavy and just blocked the pump all the time. His answer used to be a very expensive pump out but not anymore. This was a very slow response due to the heavy load in the pond…

but it has had great results.

After 3 Weeks

After 4 Weeks

After 8 Weeks