Pond Boss Forums INTRO Questions & Observations Misson Accomplished: Blocking Net in with Pics!

For those of you didn't follow in another thread I have a situation in my trout pond where the browns trout are outgrowing the brooks and mostly likely stressing them due to their larger size and the fact that they are a more agressive species anyway. I actually had them chase a couple of brooks up on the bank last fall.

It was another thing for me to learn as I assumed since I planted them all same size at the same time, all would be fine. Wrong! Apparently the water temp in summer is more optimum for the browns by a few degrees (warmer) and they are now up to 3 inches longer and up to a pound and half heavier. I've had brooks and browns in a pond before, but never this many brooks in with browns.

I caught and released three trout a week ago to see what sizes they are and there were 2 brooks; 13 and 15 inches both under 2 lbs. and one brown that was 17 inches and about 3 lbs.

It would seem the simple answer is to put them in two separate ponds, but I don't believe my well pump could keep two ponds cool enough. And I want to use one of the ponds to produce my own perch. So to remedy the siuation I have drained another pond that had only a cage and fathead minnows it it. Ordered a 12 feet by 200 feet poly bird netting with a one inch mesh (would have prefered 2 inch mesh but it would have make a perfect gill net unfortunately!) for avaries and cages from Memphis Net and Twine. Cost with shipping was just under $100.00. The plan was to put a blocking net down the center and move the brooks and browns into this pond with the two species seperated by the blocking net. I could have ordered more expensive netting but the catalog says this stuff is used on fish farms and will last a long time in the water. I also though the stretchiness of the netting would make for a nicer blocking net and this netting is very light which puts less stress on the top net rope.

Here are a few pics of the process which I have never done btw.

One thing that scared me right of the bat was the netting, when unrolled, was only about 3 to 4 feet wide! I thought there had to be a mistake as I was expecting a net that was 12 feet wide! Turns out this stuff is really really stretchy (and quite strong btw) so it worked out and it did stretch to about 12 feet.


Here I have driven two posts on each side of the pond approximately down the center with a post driver. I will drive these down even more tommorow and adjust the top of the net accordingly to play it safe. (I ran out of daylight!)




Here is the netting where I have weaved in a nylon rope top and bottom thru the mesh and attached a chain link to the bottom with cable ties.



Here is the chain link I attached to the bottom of the net to hold the net down on the bottom of the pond. I bought a roll of this on sale a while back for another project so it came in handy.




Here is the net spanning the pond. The bank on one side is actually quite a bit above the water line so believe it or not the top ot the net will be at least 2 feet above the water line to prevent trout from jumping over. Ignore the yellow nylon rope on the bottom off to the right. It has nothing to do with the net. It was used to pull the sump pump up and down and around when draining the pond. I drain my small ponds with an electric sump pump tied inside a bucket. It only takes a few days.




Here is a the net in the bottom of the pond where there was standing water. (Water keeps coming up from the water table after I stop pumping) I pushing the bottom of the net into the muck and also tramped it down to be sure there were no openings on the bottom for fish to swim through. The Chara will probably quickly hem in the net on the bottom as it grows back.



I thought I would share this with any of you that might consider doing something like this. One thing I would stress is to allow extra net to span the pond. I laid a rope down on bottom from one side to another to figure out how much net to use, but then added about 20 feet. I'm glad I did as the net not only stretches width wise it stretched lenthwise. The extra feet allowed enough slack to touch the bottom easily.

Lookin' good, Cecil. It will be real interesting to see how this turns out for you.

Hey that process looks real familiar to me. I use a few spare bricks to hold the net bottom down on the inclined pond sides.

Good Idea Eric! I may still do that.

One thing that has me concerned is I had severe thuderstorms come through last night with high winds. Seems to have moved the net a little since most of it was still above water. Once most of it is below water that won't be a problem. I hope it didn't pull it out of the bottom, but I won't know until the water clears. At least the chain seems to go a good job of holding it on the bottom.

I need to fill the pond with water ASAP as heavy rain is due tomorrow and I don't want muddy water from erosion on the exposed banks. The clay is pretty resistant to that, but it has it's limits depending on how much rain. I'm running the well in full bore and also a sump pump out of the present trout pond to speed things up!

Howdy Cecil, the net looks good. You'll have to clear things up for me. Is that the middle pond and if so, are you diverting the water from the well pond to the one nearest your house and then down to the road pond? Is the road pond the one you put the pier across and are you still planning to put a net along the pier. If you want some help catchin them out give me a call, I don't work anymore and am available anytime. Have heavy tackle! How are your YP sacks lookin? Bob-O

Bob,

I was planning on putting a blocking net off the pier in the front pond but that has been sidetracked. I don't think I will be growing out smallmouth anymore so no need for the blocking net there unless I change my mind. (Just don't have the pond space to spawn them) Part of it was economics and part of it was I had to move the perch before it was too late to sex them. However if I decide to grow out smallmouth I can always put it in. The perch are so easy to catch it would not be difficult to move them from one side of the net to the other. With some friends we were able to remove by angling all the big perch in the big pond last spring except for two.

As far as water flow it comes from the well directly to the pond the trout are in now, or it can be redirected to their new home pond with the blocking net. The big pond with the pier all the way across receives flow from this pond or I can divert it directly to the ditch and bypass the big pond alltogether.

BTW no egg strands yet! I'm beginning to worry I won't get any for some reason. If so I am out of perch production for another year!

Well I've caught and moved 18 browns and 19 brooks to the new pond where the holding net was installed. Method of capture is hook and line and a panfish jig with the barb crimped down. Fish are netted ASAP and moved to the new pond which is only a few feet away. Once I can't catch anymore on the panfish jig I switch to the pantyhose pellets. Once that doesn't work anymore I drain the pond and dip the remaining fish out.

I originally planted 75 browns and alledgly 100 brooks. I do know of 2 brown and 2 brook mortalities. I question I actually got 100 brooks from my source. But that is another story.

Here is one of the browns. About 17 inches. Fish was about 7 or 8 inches one year ago.



Here is one of the brooks. About 13 inches. This fish was also about 7 or 8 inches a year ago.





Here is the blocking net as it looks in the pond that has now been filled up. Brooks on the left and browns on the right.




Here is a before picture:

Cecil where is pic 3 ? What about buying a few YP to add to the other pond ?

You weren't supposed to ask that so quickly. I just went outside to take another picture and when I tried to upload it to Photobucket etc. I apparently lost my Internet connection. The connection is back now so I will have a before and after on here momentarily.

Can't get any perch anymore this year Eric unless I get some from a guy I know that raises them in an RAS and has someone outside of the Great Lakes produce fry for him. My supplier had problems with the winter and the fish he could have sold to me the feds wouldn't let him as his annual health inspection was on week out of date.

NO YP -- -- --

thanks cecil, i missed this somehow.... an awesome "how to" thread, beautiful trout pics. are they somewhat pale in coloration or is that just the pic?

and good luck on getting YP egg strands.

My trout tend to lighten up and then go silvery in the ponds after spawning season. I've noticed it with the trout in the local lakes too.

i was surprised how deep that drained pond is...looks to be at least 15 feet deep. the deepest soil on my place goes about 2.5 feet, then all rock.

Dave actually it's very deceptive. Due to one side of the pond being a few feet higher than the other (due to the slope of the property) it looks deeper than it is. Max water depth is only 9 feet when the pond is full.

Cecil,

My local dealer has YP, and they ship out of state. If you are interested, I can PM you with information.

Ken

Ken,

Thanks but I may find some closer if I look hard enough and want any.

Update:

In two days of fishing a few hours each day I have moved 45 brook trout and 24 brown trout to the pond with the blocking net. I planted 100 brooks and 75 browns. So I have a few days to go. The fish I moved are already feeding which is a good sign.

Salmon colored twister tail panfish jig is the most consistent thing to get them on and once that doesn't work anymore it's on to the pantyhose pellets. I did use the pantyhose pellet a little bit today and it was dynamite.

I'm hoping to have everything out that can be caught by Wednesday at the latest and then I will drain the pond and scoop out the rest of them.

I get my cottonseed meal on Tuesday.

45 + 24 = you must have sore arms!

cecil, i'm amazed you dont have lots of folks eager to come help you move fish. that would be a blast (or do you not invite anyone to yer private fishin fests?)

I'm using 10 lb. test and I reel them in and net them as fast as possible so they don't get too stressed. Then it's a quick walk to the pond that has the blocking net.

Oh I do and I have had people help me harvest them. I'm picky anymore as I've had some bad experiences. Mainly with people that mean well but don't listen. As in I don't allow any treble hooks as they damage the fish. After telling this to a guy the first thing he puts on is a spinner with a monster treble hook. Same guy had five trout break him off in a row. He killed at least three of them as I found them later on the bottom. That was a lot of money wasted. I never invited him back. Or I have people that bounce them all over the bank even after I tell them that's not acceptable. I do have a group of four guys that do everything I say and are outstanding anglers.

And in this case where it's imperative to move them from one pond to another STAT in excellent shape (not really all that fun to just horse them in) I do it myself.

I think most people view fish as being very hardy creatures. Since I've begun working with them a little I don't see it that way any more.

great point GW, same revelations kind of happened to me. my new motto has been CPR......catch, photograph, release....and handle as little as possible in the interim (unless of course one is meat fishing).

thanks to bill cody, cecil, and others here i got educated on slime. this is a good opportunity to remind everyone that disruption of the slime layer can really hurt and kill fish. if you are practicing C&R, and you have to handle the fish to release them, wet yer hands good in the fish's water before you grab them. all you gotta do is grab their body w/ dirty dry hands, this disrupts or even removes their slime layer at the points of contact and exposes their skin to infection. i've seen it wit me own eye i have, a perfect handprint of fungus on the side of a dead fish. some fish are hardier than others, but this applys to most if not all pond fish. drives me crazy when i see "professionals" on tv, "practicing" C&R, and grabbing the fish all over w/ dry hands. nobody will ever see the morts cause the fish will take days to weeks to die, and will probably sink to bottom.

And add to that most of the landing nets anglers use are hard on scales and fins due to the large mesh size. Another thing people don't take into consideration is the stress on the spinal column of a big fish when you hold it out of the water by the jaw or whatever. I've actually had trout start to bleed from injury when I held them by the head.

As of today moved 50 brooks and 30 browns. Roughly half way.