I know it'd be somewhat unpleasant, but what about placing manure around pond edges or in a pond? Could that help the fertility of a pond or just create stinking mess?

That method was used for years back in 60's and 70's. It is basically hard to control your "bloom" in a desired 18-24 inch range with organic fertilizer, good price though. I would not suggest it, but guess what I think causes ponds in the middle of Cows pastures to have some huge numbers of fish?

Thanks for the reply. The quality of cow pasture ponds and the cheap price of manure was what made me wonder.

I have used chicken litter in ponds with good results. By the way, you know what good cattlemen do to their pastures? They keep them well limed. In our area without the proper amount of lime you cannot get optimum results from your fertilizer. Lime is used to control proper PH.

Lots of research has been done with natural fertilizers to produce fish in ponds. It can be done but it is less dependable and more risky of causing oxygen problems. Different manures vary in amount of nutrients precent. Fertilization with manures often tends to produce more invertebrates (insect larvae and zooplankton) quicker by sort of bypassing the phytolankton step or stage. A large portion of the invertebrates that develop are types that feed directly on the decaying manure instead of eating phytoplankton. Phytoplankton and associated grazers are also produced with manure but they are fewer than if only inorganic fertilizer was used. With manure fertilization you often have less control of the phytoplankton blooms; especially dependably mainatining consistant blooms. Since less phytoplankton tends to be produced and a quite high decomposition oxygen comsuming process still occurs (BOD) due to the introduced amounts of rotting manure you tend to get wider swings in the oxygen levels in the pond. Thus the risk of fish loss is greater with manure fertilization.

with the automatic release fertilizers that can be easily installed and pulled if fertilization gets our of hand I would go that route if I had a choice. That said I do not need to as my trout pond that flows into my warmwater ponds seems to keep seechi dish reading at about 2 feet all summer. I guess I lucked out as I did not plan that ahead. Could have went with a smaller receiving pond and had problems. Apparently my warmwater pond is just right.