Pond Boss Forums MANAGING AN EXISTING POND Evaluating and adjusting fish populations New to the board and happy to be here!

Wow what a great resource this site is! I stumbled across it while searching on Google and I am glad I did.

Back in the fall we bought a project home. It is on a neighborhood pond and has about a dozen houses around it. The neighborhood was built in 87 and I assume the pond was built at the same time.

I have a few questions that I was hoping you guys could help with:

1) Based on what I read on this board I started feeding with pellets. Based on the instructions it said not to throw out more than would be eaten in 5-10 minutes which I am doing but I was wondering how many times a day you guys are feeding your fish?

2) I'm not sure how many acres the pond is - do you guys know if there is a way to determine the size of a pond?

3) There is apparently a beaver living on the pond as I woke up the other morning and found all the bark removed up to about 18 inches from the ground from a pine on the bank. Any suggestions on this? I was told you could wrap chicken wire around the trunk but wasn't sure if that would actually work.

4) I started working on some habitat structures but the pond has about 6 inches of sediment on the bottom and they are trying to get enough money for a dredging. If I went ahead and sunk these structures would I be putting dredging equipment at risk when we finally have a dredging one day?

I have a bunch of other questions around heavy turtle population concerns, over population of LMB, etc. But I'll search this site first to see if those questions have already been answered previously.

Thanks in advance for answers/advice!

Jeff

Welcome, Jeff. Lots of good info here and I'm sure many will be along to give you some thoughts on your questions before too long.

A few thoughts for you to at least tide you over until someone with real advice comes along!

1) I hand feed just when I'm at my farm, so I'm not a reliable source, but I think folks on here vary their feeding depending on a lot of factors. You might try a couple of times a day to start and see how that goes. Given that it's a community pond, you may want to think real hard about feeding fish that other people are going to be catching and keeping because it can get pricey.

2) This is a great site for a general idea of the surface acreage - Acreage Calculator

3) Not sure, but someone will have an idea. I think I've read that before, though, and can't imagine a beaver would want to try to tackle wire.

4) Structures may run a bigger risk of being damaged by dredging equipment, but it's a good idea to consider how they might cause difficulty or damage to that equipment just to be well prepared and insulate yourself from liability. The great thing about manmade structure is that you can generally construct and place it so it can be moved with relative ease. Lots of great threads on the forum discuss building structure and how to place it. Once you know when the dredging will occur, you can just remove it until the job is done and then back in it goes!

Again, welcome! We're glad you're here, so don't hesitate to post and get into the spirit of the forum - lots of info and lots of fun!

Thanks for the info Todd - ironically I was thinking Google maps probably had a way to calculate surface size but hadn't found it. Looks like my pond is coming in around 2.7 surface acres.

Good thought about just removing the structure - most of what I am working on is bucket/pvc structure and could be removed if needed. I am planning on mapping out all the structure as I place it to keep in my records.

As for the food I am currently only feeding in the evenings. I think I will add once more feeding in the morning just to see how well it works. Would be nice to use a feeder but unfortunately we get geese frequently and I imagine they would just camp out in front of the feeder.

I've only seen one person keep any fish - I think most folks are hesitant to eat the fish. The pond gets run off straight from the street and I imagine the nitrate levels are pretty high.

Thanks for the input!

The only way to save the tree is to wrap it with wire mesh, but that beaver has to be VERY hungry to eat pine. That's not even near the middle of their preferred food list. If you put a couple of stakes in the ground and keep the mesh off of the tree truck, so much the better.

I feed am and pm. For the structure in the pond, try hitting some yard sales or other low cost places and look for used decoys. A duck floating on the water is a lot better than a bleach bottle. Tie some rope to the top of the structure, tie the decoy on and you'll have an easy way to find and pull out the structure when the time comes.

The ones around here eat pines. Sometimes over the many other species we have. Go figure - they must be pine sap beaver. Sometimes paint will discourage them but wire is best. I also use aluminum foil in strips wrapped around the tree and painted. On pines you can stuff the foil in the bark spaces and spray a little paint. Steel or lead is much better for a fix.