I remember posting in this thread months ago and wanted to come back to it to share what has happened in my lake with my coontail problem since posting about it.

I had raked my tail off during the summer trying to get ahead of the growth. I would say I removed at least half of what was in the lake, maybe a bit more. I did all of the work in the near part of the lake, where the house, dock, and our fishing and swimming area is and I let the back half go.

Well, by Fall, it appeared that the coontail was eliminated pretty much everywhere. The large mats that I left alone disappeared. My wife thinks it was because of my work, and although I'd love for her to believe my muscle and sweat made the difference, I do believe it was the grass carp that must have turned the tide. In less than two years, the grass carp had grown to abouit 20 inches. I caught one fishing with a worm and was amazed at how large it had already grown, at least a few pounds. They may have finally grown large enough to make a difference.

The ironic thing is now I worry that maybe my fishery will be hurt by the lack of vegetation. I have several large brush piles sunk out there but plan to add more in the spring. I have a sizeable dock and am thinking about stuffing the underneath full of brush as all of my other structure I added is away from the swimming and main fishing area around the dock and our home.

One oddity I wanted to share...

After the coontail appeared to be gone, I was mowing along one of my banks and clippings were going out into the water. It looked like grass carp were feeding off the floating clippings. I could see them swimming in the shallows and tapping the surface and it looked to me like they were actually eating it. Now I am left wondering what drawbacks I could expect if the carp don't have much of anything left to eat that is growing in the water.