Midwest RakeCompany 86036 Lake Rake with Float - blue

I live on a one acre lake, and this Spring I decided that I was going to put a lot of effort into cleaning up the pond, the water, the vegetation, and improve the size and quality of the fish. So this was the first purchase towards that goal. Previously I used a stiff garden rake with 13 tines, which worked for some basic cleanup, but wasnt nearly enough to get the job done.I have heard of Midwest and their equipment, but I have never owned one before. Upon opening the box, my first impression was this thing was well built, sturdy, and actually pretty appealing to the eye. The 'rake' part is high quality (and lightweight) aluminum (i think), and it is semi sharp, to work thru any plant material if needed. I also felt like the initial quality was high, but after throwing it to the bottom of the lake, digging out muck and vegetation, that it would not last long.I was wrong...This thing has been my #1 tool around the pond and my property. The rake can be used a few different ways - a 6' long standard landscape rake or an 11' super long reach landscape rake...Or you can use the standard handle and attach the rope to throw it out as far as you can heave it. But the key is that you can add or remove the flotation device, depending on the vegetation you are working with.In spring, we had a decent amount of floating algae. To remove it, I used the full length handle and float, and pulled the algae towards the bank. Sometimes it can get to heavy, so pulling it to the bank and then removing it with the rake in smaller loads is easier. (Leave the algae on the bank for a day or 2 and it completely dries out and is easy to clean up and dispose of. After a majority of the algae was clear, we had a decent amount of coontail growing in the shallow edges around the bank. It was growing anywhere from 6" to 3' of water. For the bottom growing vegetation, I removed the full extension handle and the float, which creates a short rake that doesn't float. It sinks to the bottom and as you pull it in, you collect a ton of vegetation and you bring it to the bank. It will be heavy from being waterlogged, but again, bring it to the edge of the pond and rake it out in smaller increments.Depending on your water situation, it may take a lot of effort to get it cleaned up the first time around. I enjoyed removing everything (it is also very satisfying), and I viewed it as my exercise for the day. But once the vegetation is fully cleared, then you can just focus on routine maintenance, which is raking out smaller patches of weeds/algae as needed.After some work during the spring and summer, our pond has never looked better. The fish seem to be doing great, and they are now visible along the edges of the pond. But more importantly, the rake took a good beating during the first year of use, and it is completely unphased. I even left it outside in the elements for several weeks, and it still is in great shape.The only negatives I can think of are the fact that the throw rope isn't the longest or the best quality...But it is waterproof and its actually longer than I can throw the rake, so no issues there. And the float device seems like a pool noodle...So it wont last forever, but it can be replaced with a cheap pool noodle as needed. The velcro straps provided for the float device is very high quality and never loosened or lost its strength, even while getting a ton of use in the water.Final thoughts - this item is a little pricey, but is a great piece of equipment. You will have to put in some effort and strength, but if you do, this rake will turn your pond into an entirely different body of water. We are highly satisfied!

This rake is easy to use and works quite well on my pond. I like that you can float it on the water to easily maneuver around things. I used it to remove blue green algae. You need to move the rake slowly or it will disintegrate this algae. I removed the float and used the rake to remove hydrilla. It hooks that stuff out like crazy and I used the hydrilla for mulch in my garden. Some people have complained it is hard to remove material off the rake - that shouldn't be a big surprise if you are trying to pull out long, stringy weeds. Blue green algae comes off very easily - in fact, you have to be careful or it will fall off before you get the rake out of the pond. Hydrilla is long and stringy so don't expect it to come off like a breeze. The method that works best for me is to grab the handle close to the rake and give it 1 or 2 good shakes and most of the weeds fall right off. $100 seems a little spendy but it definitely makes it easy to keep my pond looking good

The rake works great and is quality built. The price is OK. The only knock on the transaction is that the rake arrived with NO flotation device. I can rig one up if I need to with a swim noodle and zip ties, but this company should not advertise the rake comes with a float when they have no intention of shipping it with a float.Other than that, it's a "lake rake" and it works OK.FIX YOUR MISLEADING AD to earn 5 stars.

First let me say I love this rake! We had dense reed grass in a shallow cove in our pond that had become overgrown in the last few years. The section was about 30x40 ft. My husband wanted to use chemicals to kill but I wanted a more environmentally friendly solution. He told me I was wasting money but I ordered this rake from Amazon anyway. It arrived within a week. The rake is well made and I had no issues putting it together. I took advise from another review and used electrical tape for covering the knots I made in the rope. I will admit, it took me more than a few tries to figure out how to effectively use the rake. I am certain my husband was laughing from the living room window! I don’t want to mislead anyone, using this rake takes hard work but it is very effective. It allows you to get not only weeds on surface, but if you allow it to sink you can drag out the roots on the bottom. It took a week and 14 very full wheelbarrows to clear out the area but this 60 yo woman did it by herself and my husband is now eating crow! I highly recommend this rake.

My original intentions was to use it to clear a width beside my dock so I could get my kayak into open water at the end. Dock is 66 feet long. About 54 feet was what we call seaweed. With the rake I removed the width of the rake by pulling the weed from the along side the dock to shore. Left the weed sit in a pile for 2 days to drain and dry. Easy to remove. Then I removed another rake width and discovered I could do that without getting into water. While doing that I found I could reach out further and removed swath the full length of rake. Next cleaned swimming area off side of dock. Everything worked great with minimal labor. Highly recommend rake to clear weed.

Good value and well built. It functions as stated. Happy with this purchase

This rake is absolutely amazing! It works exactly as advertised, is incredibly easy to use and actually does a fantastic job of removing algae from the top and leaves/muck from the bottom of my 1/3 acre pond. The rope/toss/pull method works surprisingly well and the handle is long enough to be very useful but not too long. Do NOT hesitate to buy this! Just buy it...now!As embarrassed as I am to post a before picture of my pond, I am including it because I want others to see what is possible. Our pond quickly got out of control this year until I purchased this rake. The second picture is honestly after about 9 hours of raking over 3 days, but after that I just let the wind blow everything to shore and raked it out over smaller sessions.

This works great on those clumps of weeds/moss sitting on top of the water. Lightweight, and I like that I can drag the weeds in easily. Take the flotation off and rake works well on weeds under the water too.

Works extremely well on a sandy or muddy lake bottom. Does not work as well if the lake bottom is rocky. Effective in removing weeds and invasive species from the lake bottom.

Great quality and works a treat for removing the dead reeds and algae form my ponds. Easy to assemble and use.

Works as advertised. Easy to handle.

this is really works well to get off water hydrilla.