Just curious how many of you have significant snow on your ponds (3 inches or more). Seems a large swath of the country is covered with snow, with some very significant.

If so, are you doing anything to prevent potential winterkill?

I just tried clearing some off of mine, it was 24-30" thick on top of 20" of ice. Even a 30HP diesel tractor w/snowblower wasn't enough to move a significant amount. Fortunately I have 40' of water depth and invested in a deicing pump to keep about 100 sqft open so winterkill isn't very likely.

Does snow that has fallen, melted, then re-froze into a honeycombed, flaky layered, unable to ice fish, absolute deathtrap count? If so, then I have about 6".

Definitely wondering about the fish....
Will move aerator to shallow water next winter...

It's all about light penetration. Opaque ice created by refrozen snow melt blocks light to some extent also.

I have about 2' on the half of the pond where the aerator is and the other half I've kept pretty clean. The ice was fairly clear for most of the winter but now is opaque from a thaw then refreeze. I also take my power auger and drill a dozen or so holes every once in a while. I have about 2' of ice. I've been using an underwater camera to moniter the fish. They're still alive and swimming but pretty lethargic. I wish I had a DO meter. Anyone selling one or know someone who is?

I got about a foot.

Have approx 6 inches of new snow on 3-4 inches of white frozen sleet snow mix.Drilled a hole for DO testing a week ago and had 86% sat and 10ppm DO @ 8 ft so was very satisfied with that reading.Have been snow covered for 5-6 weeks. Do not plan on turning aerators on unless significant drop in DO.Agree some of the shallow, older ponds or high percentage of carrying capacity may have some kill issues if this weather does not break soon.

This will be a real test for alot of ponds with such a widespread cold winter.
My trout have never made it through the winter so if they make it this year with the new improvements I've made I should be in good shape in the future.
Only about 3ft. of snow on ground which is below normal for this area, but plenty of frigid weather, and haven't gotten above freezing since Jan.2.

With the stream snowed over it looks like the rabbit came to the pump outflow to get a drink.

I have about 2' of snow and about 18" of ice. I have my shallow end open, running areation. Havent done a check to see if i lost any. Pond was just stocked in fall.

I've been running a diffuser in the shallow ends of the two ponds with fish but I'm still a little concerned. Two reasons:

About 18 inches of snow cover and I went into winter with significant submergent weeds on one half of the pond. I will temporarily get my D.O meter back from Scot and do some testing. If I have to I will put in my surface Kasco aerator and open a hole about 30 feet wide with it. I did that two years ago when D.O levels were dropping but I didn't run a diffuser that year.

Cecil. Ill bet youll find your levels fine.My small pond has a lot of vegatation and it was about the same DO level as the larger one (above) but has a small amount of creek water that runs into it year round and usually tests 100-120% saturation as it tumbles over the rocks prior to dumping into pond.I see some 50F plus in the 10 day forecast so perhaps the worst is about gone. Forecast is for minus 4 to minus 7 tonight. Those are the temps that take out my LMB and redears when I have too much open water.

Ted,

I hope you're right.

You know what's interesting? A couple of years ago (or maybe it was three years ago) when I set up the Kasco near the pier with sub zero air temps, it didn't effect my perch or bluegills at all. Of course the open water fish could get away from it but I had some fish in cages very close to the aerator and no fish lost.

I also was amazed how little the temperature dropped in the 30 foot open area created by the diffuser even with subzero temps. There was steam rising but temps still stayed in the mid thirties on the surface.

Perhaps if I had run it longer than several days I would have seen a drop. Thankfully I didn't have to, as not long after that we had a major thaw.

Hey Cecil, the snow is quite significant this year. drove around to look at local ponds, and there were no signs of life. All under the snow, and bad for it!!

But I seriously doubt my pond neighbors would put ten cents into a pond!

Are you frikking kidding, It is cold up here!

We've been iced over since around late-October/early-November, which was several weeks early for us. Our side of the mountain has not received much snow this winter -- 14-18 inches total. I think Todd3138's side of the mountain caught most of it this year -- especially when I hear the school closings and delays each morning.

We've had warm spells which has caused snow melt to flow onto the pond, and which helped the sun turn the snow on top of the pond into clear ice. Right now, we probably have about an inch of snow over 10-12 inches of ice.

Ken

I am surprized that Dwight has not posted here. He has a record amount of snow on his pond.

Or Bill Cody. Bill is worried this year as he took some D.O. readings and they were not good. Bill didn't set up a diffuser this year.