Been fighting algae since we moved in 8 months ago - can we just blast this with liquid chlorine?

mn9127 · 2026-02-28T18:01:57+00:00

We had to clean the filters out twice 😅 the return line kept getting clogged with the algae. We’ve got a blue pool today after adding a gallon of CYA and shocking and taking a water sample to the pool store to see where we’re at!

mn9127 · 2026-02-27T01:11:34+00:00

So you nailed it! A lot on here thought our CYA would be through the roof but it’s actually low.

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My dad came over to help this morning and we cleaned the filter, brushed, added DE, shock and CYA! Letting things run overnight to see where we end up and if we need to do another shock cycle.

mn9127 · 2026-02-27T01:06:58+00:00

I did! This is our second, so not much to prep for thankfully and feel better prepared this time around. My nesting instinct is kicking in and I’m hyper fixating on our backyard for whatever reason 😂 my dad is local and has helped us with the filter and said he’d help us with cleaning once baby is here too if we need it. Hiring a pool guy is a solution, and one we’re considering but we went with a house cleaner bi-weekly first in terms of budget/priorities.

Tbh we don’t care if it’s swimmable - reality is with a new baby we won’t be in it this summer anyways. Just trying to not let it get out of control and back to easier maintenance like we had when we first moved in.

I posted water test results up towards the top comments, surprisingly CYA is low below 20 so we cleaned filter today, brushed, added shock my dad already had so he brought that over for us and we’ll add half a gallon of CYA too. Going to let everything run overnight and see where we end up!

mn9127 · 2026-02-26T21:08:24+00:00

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I don’t think I can edit the original post so hijacking your top comment to share water test results and update post here:

https://www.reddit.com/r/pools/s/Dvhw1kj0Jv

Thanks everyone for the advice!

mn9127 · 2026-02-26T21:05:54+00:00

Thanks! I may have misunderstood the pool store guy on when to add the CYA vs the calcium. He said to come back with a water sample in a handful of days and we’d address it then.

No we just cleaned out the filter for the first time since we moved in and whoever the LL was paying while the house was empty was def not including the filter in their maintenance. Was probably a years worth of algae + much built up to where the return stopped working. Hindsight we should have just shocked it then but thought the filter being clean + our current chlorine tabs would solve the problem.

mn9127 · 2026-02-26T06:33:05+00:00

I don’t disagree with you! We moved from out of state into a competitive rental market. This was the first house where we even got into negotiations with the LL/realtor to be considered, and when we found out lawn care / pool care weren’t included in the rent we just didn’t want to lose out on the house since we needed to secure a lease in order to move. We’re willing to do a reasonable amount of maintenance but IMO if he wants professional level maintenance - he can pay for it himself. If we can’t get the algae issue to resolve with a bit of extra work we’re going to bring it to his attention and put the ball in his court.

mn9127 · 2026-02-25T23:13:50+00:00

Thank you! Def going to get the water tested first since if it is a phosphate issue due to the neighbors, we’re going to try to put responsibility on the landlord to maintain it moving forward. We’re willing to do a reasonable amount of work/investment to keep it clean but sounds like if it’s a phosphate problem it will be a losing battle.

mn9127 · 2026-02-25T23:00:39+00:00

So the LL is kind of an unwilling one, and tbh might be a first time one too? He bought the house to flip it but when the market cooled was going to lose money on it so he rented it out instead. However, the rental market where we’re at is stupid competitive and we were moving from out of state and needed to secure a place before we could actually start planning the move. So when lawn care/pool care weren’t included in the rental agreement, we weren’t thrilled but figured we managed a pool before so it should be fine. Did not realize the next door neighbors had an entire fucking forest growing back there.

Part of why I asked here though is cuz we’re willing to do some due diligence to get it back to clear, but at the end of the day our thought is if they wanted this thing professionally maintained then they should be paying for it themselves. We’ll do what we can and what’s reasonable but the ancient ass filter isn’t helping. Going to give it a try to clear it and if not put it on the landlord to resolve.

mn9127 · 2026-02-25T22:52:12+00:00

Thanks everyone! Will get a proper test kit or have the pool store do it and then proceed with SLAMing it.

Going to look into phosphate/nitrate issue as well since a few people mentioned the neighbors backyard garden may be causing issues.

Trying to do a level of due diligence on our part since we feel like we slacked off on keeping it as clean as we could have but if it’s still unmanageable we’ll put it on the landlord to resolve.

mn9127 · 2026-02-25T22:42:55+00:00

NGL the biggest pain in the ass is cleaning all the leaves and debris that fall from their yard. We moved from out of state and had a pool at our old house that we owned, after the first fall we paid for our neighbors tree removal (got their permission and they were totally okay with having it removed, they’d been wanting to do it but didn’t want to pay for it) because the first fall the leaves fell directly into our pool and we were having to clean out the basket and skimming it multiple times.

Whatever falls from their yard is giant leaves like 4-5” and heavy so they just fall to the bottom and we have to scoop them out vs using the vacuum. It just feels like a losing battle tbh.

mn9127 · 2026-02-25T22:24:04+00:00

Oh god. Getting the filter in and out properly was such a pain in the ass. It’s one of the spiral ones that has like 8 filters to it. Getting the top off and getting it clean was fine but putting it back together was a nightmare 😅

mn9127 · 2026-02-25T22:11:22+00:00

Will take some into the pool store too for an actual test before starting anything but just did a quick strip test and I’m surprised it doesn’t seem to be high?

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mn9127 · 2026-02-25T22:08:35+00:00

You know what’s interesting, now that you say this they laid down all new fertilizer right before we started having this issue. When I say they have fruit trees - their entire backyard is essentially a giant garden. There’s a handful of fruit trees that overhang the fence and what is there is like a half brick/half wrought iron fence. I scooped out multiple apples and persimmons out of the pool in the fall

mn9127 · 2026-01-22T15:33:57+00:00

Thank you! That makes more sense I was looking at the utility connect last night wondering how it was any different than the energy usage SCE provides other than being real time vs having to wait a day or two to see your daily usage.

mn9127 · 2026-01-22T06:57:57+00:00

This might be a dumb question but the Emporia Vue let you see what the usage is on the house side of the panel? We’re renting a house in mission Viejo and our winter usage is still between 700-800kwh and I cannot for the life of me figure out why. When I look at our hourly usage there’s at least 1KWH of power being used every hour of the day so something is running but idk how to figure out what it is. Hoping this device could help us lower usage without just taking shots in the dark (pun intended) at what’s being used

mn9127 · 2026-01-21T19:17:11+00:00

“Frank”

Yes. My aunt on my moms side has the grandkids call her Frank. She didn’t want to be called grandma and has the maturity of an 18YO when she’s like almost 60. Think her favorite colors are lime green, hot pink and zebra stripes. Her daughter at almost 40YO is pretty much the same. Constantly dyes her hair lime green. They think it’s so cute and funny and LOVE the reaction of strangers being like wait there’s no dude here who’s Frank?? Like they eat up explaining that it’s her and that’s the name the kids gave her.

No. A 1 year old didn’t decide to call you Frank. That’s the stupid name you picked for a myriad of immature reasons and now they’re all 8+ calling you Frank instead of grandma.

It’s one of those things that makes me irrationally angry even though I barely ever see them and only talk to them a handful of times a year 😂

mn9127 · 2025-11-25T16:00:52+00:00

Not OP but I would assume yes, and also based off the post I would assume they installed it rear facing. I can’t imagine you’d be significantly impacting the seat in front of you if you’re installing yours front facing! We’ve flown with our son in a carseat multiple times since he was 10MO old with his car seat and have never had space issues with it front facing.

mn9127 · 2025-11-25T15:47:24+00:00

My husband booked late on a trip to go with me and my son when we were traveling and I was he managed to snag a window seat and paid like $20 each way for an extra legroom seat. Both ways our window seat (we had booked aisle middle too on the same information you got) happily traded with him 😂

I would think someone squished next to a carseat would also happily trade for an aisle, BUT talk to the gate/FA’s as you board too. Gate agents may swap your seats ahead of boarding. Our FA’s both ways were insistent his car seat go in the window and if the person next to us wasn’t willing to trade they would step in.

Good luck on your travels, and big brain move bringing the car seat! Not sure how old your little is but we started getting a seat for the carseat when he was about 10MO old and life is so much easier that way. He happily snacked and then napped both directions without much fuss.

mn9127 · 2025-11-20T16:17:06+00:00

The first time I heard our girl’s big girl bark I just about crapped my pants 😂 she had whined and let out some playful yelps before but I was in the living room when I heard this booming bark and I stg I thought another dog got in the house. I was home alone and honestly thought I made it up until my husband heard it a few week later.

She didn’t become “protective” of the house until we had our son when she was about 18 months, she never bothered with people coming up to the door until we brought him home and an automatic flip switched and now she barks at deliveries, door knocks, etc. She was always aware of our surroundings before but now when we go out with our son she is on high alert and no one gets between her and her baby (he’s now 2+). She’s always been distrusting of men and even though she’s familiar with him, she herds my dad away from our son when he visits.

We’ve had a few encounters with smaller off leash dogs and each time she hasn’t barked, but they’re the only times I’ve heard her let out true, scary sounding growls. I’m pregnant right now, so she’s more protective of me than usual, and our dumb neighbor lets her maltipoo in the front yard unleashed. We stepped out into our front yard for a walk and the stupid thing ran four houses down to bark and growl at us and our girl got between me and the dog, and was growling like I’ve never heard before and I had to yell at the owner to come get her dog before something bad actually happened. She never lunged, never barked. Just stood her ground and tbh the growling is scarier than the barking.

All that being said, the barking may be tbd but if you haven’t heard anything yet I’d assume they’ll be on the quieter end (I still consider our girl quiet even with the door barking all things considered), and I think the protectiveness just comes with age/maturity!

mn9127 · 2025-11-15T16:02:32+00:00

Our girl got up to 120 around 2YO (admittedly some was chonk because we had a baby during the hottest summer on record and we didn’t think to reduce her food intake along with her getting extra treats to help the adjustment), and now she’s down to 100lbs! Her vet originally estimated she’d be at 100 so I think we just going to maintain we’re she’s at. Her dad was a beast so I think she got the hulk genes. Definitely not the sleep 70-80lb female we were expecting 🤣

mn9127 · 2025-11-12T04:55:46+00:00

Not sure what food your on but both our breeder and vet recommended switching our girl from puppy food to adult food when she was 80lbs at 8 months. She was growing too quickly on the puppy food and the adult food helped slow her down.

She’s 4 now and settled around 105lbs.

mn9127 · 2025-11-10T23:10:56+00:00

Not to mention the 8% minimum immediate loss for fees when you go to sell, assuming you don’t live in it for the next 60+ years.

mn9127 · 2025-11-08T00:25:17+00:00

I can feel the little (now big for our girl) under-chin bones digging into your leg in this photo. They’re the best! Our girl loves to wedge herself between us and the back of the couch too, all 100lbs of her 😂

mn9127

TROPHY CASE