green water in water trough

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little creek

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I use a 300 gal water trough for six heifers I fill tank up when the trough is about half empty, but i'm adding fresh water on top of old water and it turns green. My health wan't let me pick up trough and turn it over and I've tried to remove plug with no success. Instead of a smaller trough is there a solution to this problem. thanks little creek
 
Could you let them drink it down further and/or use a 5 gallon bucket to dip out enough water to allow you to turn it over and empty & wash it out every so often?

Or you could use hose and siphon it out? Just an idea.
 
Have some remove the plug in the bottom for you. In place of this plug install a nipple with a hand valve on it. You may wan't to run enough pipe to get the handvalve out of the way to prevent accidental opening. Then when it needs drained just open the hand valve.
 
When it gets low, dump some bleach in it and slush it around and let it sit for a while. The dip the stuff out and refill. I just dump some bleach in them, cows don;t mind.

dun
 
This might sound crazy but we put gold fish in our stock tanks to keep the grime down. They eat all the green right up! Some times the babies get picked up by birds or the sort but once they are a little more grown they work wonderfully!
 
dun":2z0p7y00 said:
When it gets low, dump some bleach in it and slush it around and let it sit for a while. The dip the stuff out and refill. I just dump some bleach in them, cows don;t mind.

dun

Sounds like well water. Ditto on the bleach, and the fish can work too. You can also let the hose just run it it for a while and let it flush itself clean. Just don't let the cows drink out of it with the bleach in it, unless you are just putting a small amount of bleach in only (no different than tap water). It tends to kill the microrganisms in their guts.
 
Same here Dun. A little bleach is a big difference in the clearity and alge in the tanks. It doesn't take much and lasts for several days.
 
We tried the goldfish-- it worked great on the algea--and they really grew.
We have to clean the tanks everyweek to remove the muzzell trash from feeding a TMR.And between loads.
It got to be a real pain moving them-- it got better after they got big enough they wouldn't get sucked out the drain hole.

I lost them all one night when the pump went out and the calves emptied the tanks :( I actually miss them-- had alot of fun watching them swim and grow.

Wonder if theres a market out there for big goldfish? I could grow alot of them in all my tanks. They went from 1/4 inch long to 8 inches just over the summer.
 
Hmmmm-- we have flatheads too (we are talking catfish right?)

I'll have to check but I don't think its legal to fish with "unnatural " live bait---- Or are they used dead???

.50/head and I might make more off them than the calves :)

Can you get more for the fancy tailed goldfish?--- seems like that would be a great "come and eat me" flag.
 
yep, we're talking catfish, the bigger the goldfish the better. We run goldfish, perch, and carp on our catfish lines. The carp we hang on the lines will weigh 1 to 2 pounds. We don't catch many fish with the carp, but they are always BIG.
 
Miss Daisy":aw09d7x8 said:
This might sound crazy but we put gold fish in our stock tanks to keep the grime down. They eat all the green right up! Some times the babies get picked up by birds or the sort but once they are a little more grown they work wonderfully!

Yep. Went to Petsmart and bought 25 goldies last June and 11 of them survived the winter, even with the trough frozen over. Our trough is about the same size. Costs next to nothing and it really helps.
 
Is the trough in the sun? Mine are spring fed, in the middle of the pasture. Sun will make the alge grow. Hubby tosses a couple catfish in them a couple times a year. Says it cleans the tank and the catfish.
 
little creek":3ahz837k said:
I use a 300 gal water trough for six heifers I fill tank up when the trough is about half empty, but i'm adding fresh water on top of old water and it turns green. My health wan't let me pick up trough and turn it over and I've tried to remove plug with no success. Instead of a smaller trough is there a solution to this problem. thanks little creek

if your health wont let you pick it up and turn it over im sure you could ask someone for a little assistance...some people really enjoy helping others out :)
 
We have goldfish in one of our troughs as well. I took a big piece of chicken wire and made it into a ball and put it in the bottom of the trough so the babies would have a place to hide.
 
Some fine grind corn meal in a nylon sock, let it soak in the trough overnite. Should get rid of the green, and not kill the cridders in the gut.
 
Every trough here has goldfish in it. I have some fond memories of going to feed the goldfish bread with my grandfather when I was a kid. I go to Petsmart and buy the feeder goldfish (translation - cheapest they have), and they almost always seem to live. Never have to feed them either.

One time at the pet store, a teenage girl helping me asked what I was using the goldfish to feed. I told her cows. Man, the look I got!
 

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