Smith Creek Fish Farm offers testing and liming as well as fish habitat enhancement services to increase productivity and water clarity.  Liming and habitat enhacement increases the over all health of your lake or pond.

Liming to Increase Nutrient Availability and to Increase and Buffer pH

The application of limestone (calcite or dolomite) to fish ponds with acid soils will increase the availability of nutrients, primarily phosphorous, to aquatic plants, specifically phytoplankton. Phytoplankton (microscopic free-floating plants) are the base of the food chain in fish ponds, and are essential for rapid fish growth and survival in recreational fish ponds and in commercial ponds in which small fish are being reared. Calcite and dolomite increase the total hardness, total alkalinity, pH, and act as a buffer to keep the pH constant. The rise in pH is primarily responsible for increasing the availability of phosphorous from the pond muds. Although pH can range from 1 to 14, pH of 6 to 9 is considered desirable for most freshwater fish. Water in ponds reflects the quality of the soils thev are in. In acid soils. ponds typically have low alkalinit,'. hardness and pH. Hardness and alkalinity values of less than 20 parts per million (ppm) and a pH value of 6 or less, are common in many ponds in the southeastern United States. Fish production in these waters is poor. Calcite (calcium carbonate) and dolomite (a combination of calcium and magnesium carbonates) both increase the hardness (the calcium and magnesium concentration) of water.

Carbon dioxide, a by-product of respiration of plants and animals, acts as an acid in water, reducing the pH, especially at night. Plants photosynthesize during the day, consuming carbon dioxide, which causes pH to increase. This daily fluctuation in pH is greatest when alkalinity is low. At higher alkalinity. more carbonates are present to bind with the free carbon dioxide in what is termed the carbonate cycle. The addition of lime to a pond increases its alkalinity (carbonate concentration) which decreases the amount of free carbon dioxide in the water, and therefore increases and buffers the pH.

Phosphorous is almost always the limiting nutrient in freshwater ponds, and is relatively unavailable when pond soils have low pH values. The increased pH resulting from liming improves the availability of phosphorous, making fertilization more effective. In addition. microbial activitv is increased at higher pH, which will assist in decreasing the amount of organic debris at the bottom of the pond. (University of Florida)

Fish Habitat Enhancement