Good day, ladies and gentlemen. I'm Dr. West Bishop with SePRO Corporation, and welcome back to the Algae Corner!

Today's episode is on SeClear Algaecide and Water Quality Enhancer. We’ve spent a lot of time talking about nuisance types of algae: filamentous, plant-like, and macroalgae, but today we actually get into different solutions for them. SePRO has a solution for all your algal management control needs, but today we're specifically focused on SeClear.

A Two-In-One Product

As an overview, SeClear is the only EPA-approved algaecide and water quality enhancer. Think of this as a two-in-one product. Not only does it kill and control the nuisance algae, but it can actually improve and restore water quality with each application. It can take out a little bit of phosphorus, for example, every time you use it. When used in a program approach, it changes the game by reducing nutrient availability.

Multiple Uses on a Variety of Sites

Water treated with SeClear can be used for almost anything. Drinking, swimming, fishing, watering livestock, irrigation. There are no use restrictions on the label. SeClear is ANSI/NSF Standard 60 certified, meaning it can be used in drinking water up to the maximum label rate. So there are very broad uses with SeClear and you can apply it to a lot of different types of water resources.

A lab demonstration before treatment with SeClear




A lab demonstration after treatment with SeClear

In the lab, we can see how SeClear not only quickly binds to algae and controls it, but also rapidly removes it from the water column. This is very important when it comes to toxins, taste and odor compounds, and other nasty things housed inside the algae. You want to control the algae, but you also want to get them out of the water column quickly. This is very important for rapid control, but also in situations like drinking water treatment to remove those nasty compounds from the water resource.

Seeing is Believing

Field results with SeClear are pretty powerful. They can happen quite rapidly as well. In this instance, we’re looking at a cyanobacterium in a drinking water reservoir. There was rapid improvement in water quality and clarity following the SeClear application.

Through detailed studies of SeClear, we can see how powerful it is as an algaecide. Not only will it control nuisance and toxin-producing types of algae, but it will also allow for regrowth of beneficial types. Better types of algae, like green algae, can come back, which can move up the food chain while staying at lower densities.

Copper sulfate, on the other hand, can have a little impact on some of those nuisance algae. However,  it rapidly regrows. You often fall in the cycle of needing more copper with copper sulfate, as opposed to SeClear. Because copper sulfate isn’t doing anything to address the nutrients, it's not taking out any of the phosphorus.

With more applications in a routine program approach with SeClear, you're getting more phosphorus out of the water column through time. Overall, this changes your system for the better, and it actually causes you to need less copper over time.

Effective on a Broad Range of Algae

SeClear can control almost all types of algae. It’s very good on planktonic forms, especially cyanobacteria, the blue-green algae we talked about. They can be the toxin and taste and odor producers in drinking water. SeClear works great on those nasty scum-forming types that you don't want in your system, both proactively and reactively. It also works well in some of those thick, green algal mats that impede your ability to fish and swim in the water, and it can work very well on benthic macroalgae.

Flexibility in Formulations

There is a granular version of SeClear, SeClear G, that can target benthic mats of both filamentous and macroalgae much better.

Summary

To review, SeClear is the only EPA-approved algaecide and water quality enhancer. Think of this as two products in one. It removes phosphorus with each application. It can both control and remove algae from the water column rapidly. Using SeClear can select for good types of algae and allow them to move up the food chain to grow bigger bass, as well.