For about 3 to 4 weeks now I have had copper nose bream floating up. Sometimes over days at a time there will be 5 to 10 a day. Most of the time you can tell they had been dead for a while. I thought this kill was done with as it's been a week or so since any floated and then again 5 or so bream will float up, some fresher than others. The start of the deaths coincide with a few things that occurred. I added 3 pounds of fat head minnows, we had two days in a short period where we had the most rain I have ever seen, 11 inches in a day then another 6 inches just two days later. On both occasions my pond overflowed and the ditch behind the house overflowed, water was flowing from pond to ditch. During this period a couple of what I think were Asian carp swam near the pond, one went into the pond and one went into the flooded field. The pond got extremely cloudy after the second heavy rain, not sure why because no silty water washed into the pond that I could see, it looked very clear. I did add 4 Drums of ESS13 on Dec 31 last year, had a pretty good fish kill then too. Just trying to figure out what the most likely cause might be. Any ideas at all.

I have no clue but with your luck, I think you should forgo the lottery for a spell. Good luck.

I would guess a very large change in water quality, then a bunch of swings in PH. For the same reasons you shouldn't change more than 50% of water in an aquarium at a time, ever. A number of things can happen with this much water exchange that will stress fish:
Large Ph swings
Large Temperature swings
Large die back of phytoplankton adding to the problems.
Large change in alkalinity and salts.

That is a heck of a lot of rain. If we had that here in the hills, it would be an unprecedented disaster of biblical proportions. The fish in my pond would be the least of my worries.

Thanks for the reply,
The rain did cause quite a few problems in our area just not at my house. I am on the high end of town. Typically the close one is to the Mississippi the better off you are around here flood wise.
Well all of those things might have occurred. I need to check my pH on a regular basis just to get a baseline. The well I normally keep my pond full with is on the salty side. That much fresh rain water probably did cause a pretty big alkalinity and salt change. I also noticed that the water in my pond got relatively clear compared to normal after the cloudiness went away. Might have been the phytoplankton kill you mention. Just noticed today my pond is now very green. The other change that could have brought on that you mention is I used to have to add a whole lot of the salty well water to keep the pond full. Now it's staying pretty full, I think the ESS13 might be working so that will also change everything. Maybe all of that well water helped to stabilize the water quality. Besides pH I can also run alkalinity at work to get a baseline. Well now my baseline might have changed. significantly from what it was before.

pH typically will swing highest at midday. Just be aware of the time of day when taking pH samples.

Don you got enough water in those 2 days to fill a pond!! All that water exchange could not have been good. Let me ask you this. Did you have your air stations running when all this rain came down? I was told if you can it's a good idea to have them running. It will help keep that cold rain water mixed better and not be such a shock to the pond at the time it's raining so hard. Not sure if there is any merrit to that but it sounds resonable.

Anyway I hope you stop getting floaters man that would be depressing!

Good Luck!
RC

I was going to post the same type question. I have noticed every couple of days that I have a few dead....always the bulls but I am in just the opposite situation....I have had very few rains.

My pond is about 2 acres and about 2 yrs old