My house has a drainage ditch running in front next to the street. Unfortunately, my next door neighbor has neglected his ditch and now my ditch does not drain properly and fills up with algae. I'm working with the city to have this resolved, however in the meantime…
Are there any plants or other non-chemical methods for controlling the algae in the ditch? Are there any methods for helping the water evaporate faster? Perhaps changing the slopes of the ditch?
I'm not looking for something like fish because there's not enough to support them, but even during summer there's a decent amount of water in the bottom (I live along the Texas Gulf coast so there's a decent amount of rain year-round).
Best Answer
Throw some bales of barley straw into the water. Barley straw is often used to control algae in fish/garden ponds. I've had pretty good luck using it in my pond. I hear that when the barley decomposes it releases/creates hydrogen peroxide and kills the algae.
Another thing you might try is adding snails and/or tadpoles to the water. They'll eat the algae (and the tadpoles will eat mosquito larvae too.) Adding a few goldfish wouldn't be out of the question either.
Water Hyacinth, Water Lilies, and Lotus are all good plants that will prevent algae from growing by limiting the amount of sunlight that can penetrate the surface of the water. Elodea is an underwater plant that will eat up all the nutrients that the algae need to survive.
The plants are going to set you back quite a few bucks, but the "critters" are pretty cheap. I think you can buy goldfish for fifteen cents each or something like that.
You could go all-out and pick up the plants and critters at the same time and make the ditch into a water garden....but that's a whole other thing.