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Joined: Feb 2011
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A little history and info of what I know before I begin with the questions. In 2010 I bought a house that came with 40 acres and a pond on it. The pond was originally dug with a bulldozer as a wildlife pond and is probably a little over an acre in size. About 75% of it is only about 3ft deep, but I do have about 25% that is around 10ft right now. There is no inlet or outlet, it's pretty still water. The entire pond is surrounded by trees so I'm sure it gets plenty of leaves in it in the fall. The soil in and around the pond seems to be pretty mucky, almost like a swamp. That's odd to me because anywhere else that I dig on land is almost pure sand after a couple feet of topsoil. Very little if any vegetation grows in the pond. No moss or seaweed or anything like that and I'd guess that would be from the water clarity. It is a pretty deep brown color and so visibility is probably only 12" or so. I would really like to keep fish in it as I love to fish, but I have no idea if it's capable of even keeping gamefish. In the summer of 2010, I fished it a little and did catch a few golden shiners. That winter, it froze hard and long (and water levels were WAY down) so I ended up having lots of dead golden shiners floating after the thaw. I did have some BG and Crappie dead that I think were ones I threw in that winter from ice fishing a buddy's pond. Since then I have thrown in around 150 mature BG, 60 LMB around 8", and a handful of mature crappie. I just was attempting to get SOMETHING in there that I could catch. BUT I have not caught anything in the pond since, even after throwing in all those fish. I don't know if the water clarity is so poor that they can't see the bait, or if the fish simply have died and aren't in there. The only thing is, after every time I've thrown fish in there (80+ BG at one time in one instance), I've never seen any floating dead in the days afterwards. The only living things I see in there are turtles and thousands of big tadpoles that are very close to becoming big bullfrogs.

So basically, I don't know where to start. If the pond will house fish as is, I would be willing to stock it with plenty of baitfish and go the proper route of getting it up and going, but I want to make sure that I'm not paying to stock it properly if they are just going to die in the days after. I have not had the water quality tested either.

I know that's a lot of info and without seeing it in person it's hard to get a good grasp at what I'm dealing with, but if anyone maybe has suggestions on the steps I should take, that would be greatly appreciated. I can take pictures (and probably will anyway) of anything and post them if that would help. Thanks guys and gals.

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I know the type of soil, I've seen it before. The dark mucky soil comes from 100's of years of organic matter. If the pond winterkilled once, it will do so again unless steps are taken to prevent that (i.e. aeration with an electric aerator).

If the water level bounces up and down, then you should base your stocking rates on the lowest water levels.

If fish die, I'll bet the turtles clean them up pretty quickly. Are you able to visit the pond daily? If GSH live in the pond, then I think the BG/LMB would too.

It probably is just a matter of finding out where the fish are hanging out to catch them. If it was my pond, I wouldn't put any more crappie in there - I don't want to spend that much time managing my pond (dealing with crappie).


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3/4 to 1 1/4 ac pond LMB, SMB, PS, BG, RES, CC, YP, Bardello BG, (RBT & Blue Tilapia - seasonal).
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The pond is only about 100 yards behind my house so I can visit daily. The water levels seem to fluctuate with the water table. As for the muck, I've been wanting to get my hands on a dragline to dig it all out and deeper while im at it. Just haven't had the opportunity yet. I see you're from Indiana as well and fairly close by (I'm close to Mentone, IN), is there any places near that will test my water so I can get a general idea of the water quality? Or a place I could mail a sample to?

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According to MapQuest, 35 miles. I don't know of a place locally. I stopped at the County extension office and they didn't know what I was talking about when I asked the same question.

http://soiltesting.tamu.edu/files/waterweb1.pdf


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3/4 to 1 1/4 ac pond LMB, SMB, PS, BG, RES, CC, YP, Bardello BG, (RBT & Blue Tilapia - seasonal).
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Thanks. I will send a sample off and post the results when they come back in.


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