First of all, we really enjoy your magazine and find it very informational. I've got a Bachelor of Science in Biology with a minor in chemistry and work as an envirnmental engineer at a local refinery. I find your technical information to be very accurate with my education, which partly consisted of ecology, ecology of polluted waters, limnology, and ichthyology.

Some Background:

We have a 2.5 year old 65 acre pond on the Texas gulf coast, which is an extremely productive and fertile area for bass ponds. Mean depth is around 4ft. with a substantial amount of 6ft. to 7ft. water as well. Due to its location, the biggest vegetation problems are alligator weeds and bladerwart (sp?). Inital stocking consisted of fathead minnows, coppernose bluegill, and straight Florida strain Largemouths.

Here's my question?

Some of the bass we have been catching have sores or Lesions. These types of sores are fairly common on bass in the local bayous and marsh ponds of Southeast Texas, especially during the summer. My limnology professor said these sores were from stress and possibly low oxygen levels, but that was years ago and we were not discussing our pond specifically.

Is there a specific reason for the sores/lesions?

Will they effect the overall physiology of the fish? short-term? long-term?

Is there something on the market that we could apply to the fish we catch with the sores?

(ph is right around neutral, but water in this area tends to be slightly acid due to slightly acidic rainfall. I can assume the diurnal curve on this pond is the classic high during the peak daylight and drop in the peak night, due to abundant photosynthetic vegetation. Water temps get in the 80's during the summer, but have been in the 70's lately)

Thanks for any help,
Mark