Can chicken poop cause green algae?

[Manedwolfy]

I don't know if this is the right forum, but none of the others seemed to look like it would fit. Sorry if this post is out of place.
So, it's basically winter, and we've never had as much green algae in our pond. It's just a sudden outburst, and it's quite weird. The only change we've made is moving one of our smaller chicken coops next to the pond. I'm wondering if chicken poop can slide into the pond from rain, and cause green algae growth? Does anyone have experience with this?

 

[Chick-N-Fun]

Did you have a surge of warm weather? Has it been sunny?

 

[Manedwolfy]

We did for a few days, but it started before that. A little after we moved the coop.

 

[Chick-N-Fun]

Maybe what you are seeing is the chicken feces dissolved in the water and not actual algae???

 

[Chick-N-Fun]

Maybe move the coop and see if it goes away? A great science experiment!

 

[Manedwolfy]

Maybe... I'll have a closer look and see if it looks more like feces.

 

[feathermaid]

It may not be chicken poop directly, but the nitrogen contained in poop. If the chicken area gets wet with rain, then it's likely the runoff from the saturated ground entering the pond. The other possibility would be phosphorus from landscape fertilizers.

I learned a trick a long time ago when I had horses and rented a house that had a pond in the pasture. My landlady loved the horses but she insisted on growing bamboo plants around the pond. As it turns out, bamboo happens to consume large amounts of nitrogen so the manure runoff was neutralized before it hit the pond.

If you can't move the coop away from the pond, you might want to plant some bamboo.

 

[Manedwolfy]

Alright thank you. We're able to move the coop, so I'll do that.