I'm new to the forums and new to pond management. I have recently had the dam broke on my 1/4 arce pond (read mud hole)and am looking forward to getting it fish worthy over the next year or so. I though I'd use my intro post to test out adding an image of my pond. My hopes are squashed a little because I could not get an avatar to take. It said it was the wrong image type. I tried jpg and gif of 79x79 pixels in size. Anyhow, I look forward to being a member.



Looks like the photo took, any advice on the avatar? Idon't see my signature on the preview, but I'll submit and see what happens...

welcome from deep east Texas!! Ask lots of questions and don't forget to subscribe to Pond Boss Magazine. More than worth the money!! Have fun.

Good time to get rid of some mud and deepen it.

QA,
Welcome to Pond Boss...tons of good info and helpful folks here. I would absolutely get it mucked out at this point. That's what we did when we expanded. Mucked 5' of only "God knows what" out of the bottom of my li'l mud hole. I never knew something could smell like that. You will be way ahead of the curve if you bite the bullet and do it now.
stickem'

Welcome, "neighbor!"

Get that thing mucked out this year and start it off right. Might take a loooooong time to dry out that pudding enough to push it around.

Welcome to PBF from SE Ks.

Thanks for the welcome folks!

The dam was broken so the old pond could be "mucked out". It has not rained since we broke the dam (a week and a half ago) and the muck is cracking open and I can walk out from the original bank about 10 feet before I start sinking and who knows haw far I would go if the crust let loose. The pond seems to have the potential to be 6 to 8 feet deep by just removing the mud. We'll see when my dirt man comes back out later this summer. In the mean time I have to develop my plan for further excavation/pond design and stocking options. It seems that with what research I've done that a catfish pond is an option or a bluegill/bass pond. The latter is my preference with maybe a few albino channels for the cool factor. I'll be posting my design ideas and questions when my research is further along.

Here is an old thread of mine about mucking out an old pond. Maybe it can keep you entertained till you get some heavy equipment actually moving some of your muck.

Reclaiming a 50 year old pond

QA, Welcome! The muck won't fully dry below about 10 inches and stay soupy below 18" unless turned and spread out.

I grew up in Boonville...what part of central MO are you in?

You have plenty of fish options when starting out fresh...from walleye/smallmouth/yellow perch, to a simple hybrid bluegill/catfish pond.

Thanks for the link snrub... I'll get to reading beyond the first page after my reply here. And, Rainman, I live just north of Sedalia at the end of the gravel road.

This old pond is one of the challenges that caused me to buy the place. Previous owners bought the land in the '30s so no telling how old the pond is. There is a cedar at the base of the dam about 12 inches in diameter and a Osage orange about 20". I'm guessing the trees are 30 years old or so as that just gives a minimum age of the pond. Hopefully it will be new by the end of the year and we can start the clock again.

Cool, QA I had a couple acres in Houstonia on H/KK hwy.

If you want some good fish cover, push that Osage Orange out with a dozer, then cut the stump about five or six feet from where the ground level was. Then when you place it in the pond, tip it on its side with the root ball 90 degrees from how it was growing.

The other way I did it, but did not like it quite as well, was cut the stump short (wanted the post from that one) then turn completely upside down so the root ball was on top. The other way the 6' of log gives fish a place to swim under the log and the root ball sitting mostly vertical. Osage Orange stumps will last a long time as cover.

The cedar will work great too. The ones that are too big, you can trim the limbs off one side and place the trunk on the bottom of the pond with the remaining limbs sticking outward and upward. If the limbs are still going to stick above water level (my wife did not want a trashy looking pond - imagine that) you can just top the limbs with a chain saw to the correct height.

I weighted all my tree parts down with big concrete foundation pieces to make sure they did not float.

Adding my new avatar here so I can copy/paste the address into my profile.

Hope you don't mind me putting my avatar here also. I couldn't find a good place to put it then I saw this