Pond Boss Forums MANAGING AN EXISTING POND Fertilization brown water..no bite

I had a nice green bloom and and it has turned into a brown color. Have had a hard time catching fish the last couple of weeks. Looked in log of fish removed this time last year and we were taking out on average 8 to 10 pounds of bass 15" and under (23 acre lake). We were really catching lots of fish in May of 03. The "bite" is way off. Lucky to get one bite or one caught last couple of times out. Anyone have any thoughts.
Seki reading is 18".

The brown is zooplanktom. It naturally follows the original green bloom.

The lack of bite. I experience this too each year. I always chaulk it up to a post spawn pattern. Hang in there, they will start back biting soon.

We have the same thing every year after getting a good bloom. We have always thought it was just the fish having a change in the water and it just takes a few weeks for them to adjust. The bloom definitely slows the fishing down for us.

thanks for your thoughts.... am going fishing this afternoon and in morning. Will update on if fishing is improved. I added 1 gallon of liq. fert. last thursday (23 gal) to see if that helped.

It helped. Water turned green and fish are biting.

Wayne, Are you in northern or southern alabama? Depending upon where you are be careful of fertilizing anymore as the temp. hits the 80's especially if you have any runoff going into your pond!! The zooplankton is every bit as beneficial as the phytoplankton(green color) most of our marsh waters stay a brown color year round and they are loaded with fish.

James Ed... I am in west central Alabama. Talked to fish biologist and he thought we might have had a plankton die off from some cold temps in late April and early May. Resulting in low oxygen from dead plankton thus causing stress on bass. Not enought to kill the bass but just enough to stress them and not bite. Some nights got down to high 30's. Showing about 18" visibility on the seki dish.
Thanks for the input. Again the bite seems to have returned. Will be very careful adding fertilizer. Have had a bunch of rain in last couple of days.

i asked this question a few weeks back , no reply. when you fertilize to get the proper bloom , i understand the little fish benefit from the bloom , but do the bigger fish eat the bloom also when they breathe , like filtering fish in the ocean do. just wondering

you would think if you fertilize your water you would have an answer to this.

Ken - its the "food chain" principle.
If needed, and if properly administered, a pond fertilization program will promote phytoplankton; which serves as food for zooplankton; which feeds other aquatic invertebrates (and some minnow/shad species); which feed your larger forage fish - such as bluegill; which feed your predator species. Basically, is is cheaper and more efficient to fertilize the low-end of the food chain than to directly feed the top-end predators.

Kelly , i understand the all of that , my question is do the larger fish also eat the bloom by breathing in the water , through their gills ? would this explain the lack of larger fish activity , they are just not hungry. lol

By "larger fish", I presume you mean bass and/or catfish. If so, then no, they do not feed on phytoplankton or zooplankton. They are not filter-feeders. They're regarded as predators/carnivores (though both will eat fish food, grains, etc.).

thank you