Our dam has gone cloudy and smells like sulphur

4 posts
Sun, 04/12/2015 - 19:28 #1

Member for

9 years 9 months
Ant_1984
Last seen: 03/08/2018 - 21:05
Joined: 02/01/2015 - 21:41

Our dam has gone cloudy and smells like sulphur

Hi. Our dam has gone cloudy and smells like sulphur. We have only been at the property for 6 months so I'm unsure as to whether it is a seasonal thing or not. The dam is 40m x 30m and 7m deep. Is it something I should be worried about? Thanks for any heap
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Mon, 04/13/2015 - 11:03 #2
barb
Last seen: 09/17/2019 - 18:07
Joined: 11/23/2011 - 09:38

Hi,

I'm no expert on this at all. However, here in south East Qld., which is in the sub tropics, when the season changes and the surface water becomes cold, the water on the bottom is warmer than the surface water. This causes the dam water to 'turn over', bringing the bottom muddy, smelly, algae laden water to the top, because heat rises. It is a convection current. We used to do an experiment in high school, where we would put a flask of water over the flame of a Bunsen Burner and then drop a condies crystal into it. The water on the bottom of the glass flask was warm and you could see the pink coloured stream of water swirling in a convection current, from the bottom to the surface of water in the flask. There is a big possibility that this is what is causing the cloudiness and smell. Just a thought anyway.

 

cheers,

Barb

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Mon, 04/13/2015 - 11:25 #3
Ant_1984
Last seen: 03/08/2018 - 21:05
Joined: 02/01/2015 - 21:41
Thanks barb. That makes sense as the last few weeks have been quite a bit cooler. Is there anything that can be done to minimize this? Thanks again
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Mon, 04/13/2015 - 19:55 #4
barb
Last seen: 09/17/2019 - 18:07
Joined: 11/23/2011 - 09:38

Hi again,

 

Nothing you can do except have patience. If the problem is caused by the seasonal water temperature differences in the layers of water in the dam, it will settle down as the water temperature from top to bottom of the dam, more or less equalises. Then the sediment will begin to fall to the bottom of the dam until next season. When the water temperature equalised in the flask on the Bunsen Burner, the convection current stopped and the water was more or less a pale pink. The experiment was to demonstrate how the warm water rose to the top. Science was one of my favourite subjects at school and still is. Bit of a book worm I guess.

 

Cheers,

Barb

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