Pond Boss Forums INTRO Questions & Observations Keeping fish from escaping during floods?

I dug a small pond (~100' circle) this summer where two grassed waterways meet. That spot stayed too wet to drive over with the tractor most of the time, and it proved to be pretty difficult to excavate. Had to hire a trackhoe to dig below 3', as the bulldozer hit water table at that depth. About half of the bottom is 5-8'. It filled up about a month ago, with one 3" rain.

I stocked 200 CC, 200 HBG, and 4# FHM on the day Ike hit here, and the 2 1/2" rain made the "overflow" run like the pond wasn't there- about 5-6" deep.

Now I'm wondering how many little fish just washed out, and what to do to prevent this in the future. Any ideas?

thanks

Welcome dekalb.

People have used different types of fencing to keep fish from escaping. You need to be careful if you do this because if the fencing gets clogged it may allow the water to go over the dam which is not good.

As long as you don't make the fence taller than the dam you should be ok.

Hi dekalb08, I would be more concerned about outside fish coming into my pond. Fish are relatively cheap and within a few seasons you'll have more fish than you want anyway.

PS. I'm no expert

Chris,

There is no dam, as this was an excavation (1250 cu.yards of clay were removed from the site), so that's not a concern. Should I fence off the outlet back aways in the pond, maybe use 1/2" netting over hog panels on steel posts? Or try to build something right where the water goes out? I'm trying to imagine how this would look- not pretty!

Am I being paranoid? Are stockers likely to go for swift shallow water leaving a pond? This probably will run a dozen times a year, 5' wide and 5-6" deep in the middle.

Anyone have pictures or descriptions of what they've done?

I did a quick search but couldn't find anything. I know there are some pictures though.

If you have the eqipment I would make the spillway wider. That way the water would be shallower and you would probably only lose the Fatheads.

Most pond fish don't like current so they will probably just hunker down. Grass Carp are one fish that do like current and will go downstream if you don't have a blocking net. You would probably only lose the small fish that are not strong enough to outswim the current.

I guess I'm an oddball...

I wish something would remove half the fish from my pond.

I have the same problem every spring when the rain comes. I have a 12" culvert with chicken wire over it for my overflow but it gets clogged up with weeds in heavy rains and then spills over above the culvert. So what i did was went to Walmart and bought 2 sein nets i think there 4 x 20, zipped tied them together and put in T-post every 4 feet and zip tied the net to the T-post. I made a u-shapped wire to go over the bottom of the sein net and into the ground so the net wouldnt push up. Its a pain in the ass but i only have 2 do it once a year. The reason i did this was cause i come home one day culvert is clogged, water is spilling over and all down the back side of the pasture was 100's of baby bluegill in the grass. Thats depressing!

I suspect you are at least somewhat selective about which half you want to lose, and hence no oddball around here.

It's not a spillway, but here's what I put on my first pond's drain inlet:


The primary consideration is that it is better to lose fish than a dam. Note above that if the water gets high enough (from lots of rain or a blocked screen), it by-passes the screen and enters the drain from the back side. This happens before the pond level rises enough for the emergency spillway to be in use.

Hello dekalb08. Worrying about your fish? Yep, you're gonna fit in just fine around here. Welcome to Pond Boss.

Must resist the urge to comment. Don't hijack thread. Stay on topic. But I've got soooo much material running through my brain that would work well here. I can't belive it, he just served it to me on a silver platter. And Theo, he let him off easy. Just one post, one little comment, what could it hurt?

I'll take "Things That Are Going Through JHAP's Brain" for $1,000 Alex.

Thanks for the picture, Theo. How deep does the water get over the drain before it hits the emergency spillway? Is the water ever deep in the spillway?

JHFV, I think I'll try the seine net idea. So far I've not seen any trash floating, so maybe it won't clog too fast.

Another thing I've been thinking about is making a diversion channel for the inlet waterway closest to the outlet, so that I get less water coming into the pond during floods. I'd guess that a really big rain would change all the water several times over, maybe losing pond organisms, nutrients, etc?

Also, that "USDA Ponds-planning, design, construction" book has me worrying about inlet erosion silting it in. Apparently this kind of pond is vulnerable to digging inlet channels back from where the waterways joins the sloped edge. I've seen some of that already, and have dumped gravel in the places that washed so far. They recommend culverts that extend out past the edge. Has anyone here gone that route?

The fish truck was here yesterday, and I bought some 6-8" CC, 3-4" HBG, and more fatheads. Also put in 25 3-4" LMB, which don't look big enough to bother the little fish I stocked initially.

Thanks for all the welcomes.

There is no "Ill Take Things That Are Going Through JHAPS Brain".

Sorry,I just couldnt resist,Ill go to my room now.

The emergency spillway on this pond is roughly 2' above normal full pool. I have only had water use the emergency spillway once, when it might have been 3" deep there. (The exit from the drain box is 8" double-walled corrugated black plastic, which comes in 20' sections with a single-layer plastic sleeve on one end to slide the next piece of pipe into. When originally installed, we left the sleeve on the end inside the drain box and a heavy rain event collapsed it about 2/3 of the way, letting much less water enter the 8" pipe. After that, I cut the sleeve off. This is the only time the E-spillway was reached; I don't think the pond has gone much over a foot above full pool since then.)