How to Know When It’s Time to Shock Your Pool

As a pool owner, you know that proper maintenance protects your pool as well as your guests. Part of the maintenance process includes shocking, or raising the chlorine levels to rid your pool of any contaminants or buildup that occurs when you use your pool frequently. If you are new to pool ownership and are trying to learn more about protecting it, here are some situations in which you will know when it’s time to shock your pool. 

You Use Your Pool All the Time

Pools are popular during the summer. After all, you can call some friends, grab your favorite drinks from the liquor store Lawrenceville, NJ, and cool down during the extremely hot months. When your pool is used regularly, the overall chlorine levels in your pool water drop. Chlorine helps to make sure that any bacteria in the water is eliminated, and when the chlorine level is too low, swimmers are left susceptible to the bacteria. If people are constantly swimming in your pool, you need to shock your pool at least once weekly to keep these low chlorine levels from potentially harming your health. 

Recent Storms Have Added Rainwater or Debris to Your Pool

Although rainwater doesn’t commonly harm the health of your pool, it could have an overall effect on your pool’s PH levels and may add contaminants to the pool water. In addition to the rainwater from storms, you also have to worry about any debris that may have blown into your pool during a storm. This debris can build up in the pool and cause issues as well, explain professional swimming pool contractors in New Jersey. If any storms have harmed your pool, shock it as soon as possible to keep any of these changes or contaminants from causing lasting damage. 

The Water Levels in Your Pool Have Changed

If your water levels have dropped dramatically, you are obviously going to have to refill your pool to get the water level back to normal. Filling your pool back to the original level will not replace all of the chlorine that was lost when the water levels dropped. After you have filled your pool back up, make sure to shock it so that you can ensure that you have the proper chlorine levels to keep your pool algae and bacteria-free. 

If There Have Been Any Accidents in the Pool

If you have plenty of children swimming around in your pool, you are probably going to have at least one fecal-related accident in your pool. If this happens, you must clear out of the pool immediately and remove the remnants of the accident from the pool. Once you have cleared out as much of it as you can, you will then need to shock the pool to ensure that no bacteria could infect anyone who swims in the water afterwards. Make sure that you also put a lot of chlorine in the pool as some fecal-related bacteria are known to be chlorine-resistant. 

At the Beginning and End of the Pool Season

As a matter of course, you should shock the pool at the start of the season and at the end. Pool chemicals can get out of whack during the winter. And a final shock for the season disinfects the water. 

Some people don’t remember to shock their pool until the swimming pool water is cloudy or algae is visible. Shocking is an important part of pool maintenance, and now you have a better idea of when pool shocking is necessary so that you can keep your pool safe from bacteria and keep your swimmers happy.