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Ok, guys, here is my story. I didn't want to split it in parts like "How did I make the dam", "What kind of fish are there", so I made one story. Enjoy.

Part I

My first adventure connected to ponds started ~15 years ago. A relative of mine had a land property and made first pond on it by simple digging by excavator. After that 2 other ponds were made in the same way.
They weren’t large and they weren’t deep enough too. Our winters can be very cold and long (last winter ice was ~0,5-0,6 m (~2 feet) thick on some lakes). Without proper aeration fish usually can’t survive in a pond with max. depth ~2m (7 feet). Probably the crucian carp is the only one that can tolerate water with such low oxygen level...

Some years ago we decided to make a bit more serious pond in a valley. It’s a pity that I don’t have any pictures from the first works – how did we cut trees, how top soil was removed and how the dam was created by bulldozer. frown
After these great earth works we let it rest for a year. Dam would get greater density and plants would appear. Stocking fish in a brand new pond isn’t a very smart idea. Probably they would starve or even die because of lack of food.

So, area of the new pond is planned to be 1 hectare or a bit more (that’s about 2,5+ acres). It will be made of 2 similar area parts – the deep one (max. depth could be even 5 m; 16-17 feet) and the shallow one (max. depth could be ~3 m; 10 feet).
Now the deepest part is partly filled with water. We can’t raise the water level higher because there is additional work to be done. Some trees have to be cut and dam isn’t finished yet. It’s expected that year 2012 winter fish won’t need aerator any more smile

I don’t give much about large ponds without proper water level control system. Usual spillway works only if there is too much water. But if there are unwanted fish and you don’t see any way how to get rid of them? So, we decided to make such system as in further pictures (well, it’s hard to describe it in details because my English isn’t that good). Watch them and if you got any questions, feel free to ask. I’ll try to explain.

[Sorry about picture quality – some of them are taken by a bit damaged camera].




Just a view to a dry pond (that little water amount doesn’t count). Picture taken from the dam. As you see, some birch-trees and bushes have to be cut. On the left side you see a place where dam has to be improved.



Pipe for spillway.



The same but this time concrete base is done.



Steel reinforcement is supported by 3 wooden planks.



The same but from another viewpoint.







Conreting works are continued.



After a rain. Water level can’t raise higher because it reaches pipe and flows away.

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Part II



The same time. You can see two depth levels.

Ok, I think that a little explanation about that kind of spillway is needed. In most cases here they are made like concrete chimneys with one side open. Wooden planks are put there to regulate the water level. If you wish to lower it then take one plank out and otherwise. When water reaches level of top plank, it flows in the chimney and gets to the pipe. There is one disadvantage – top layer of water is full with oxygen and it’s better for fish.
This time it is a bit more advanced. There are 2 layers of wooden planks and water is taken away from the depth.
I made 2 fast sketches just in case.





October:
So, when everything was done, we put the planks and started waiting for rain. Another water source is a little brook from other pond but its water amount is dependent on rain too…

1st November, some pictures.













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Part III

Now the most interesting part... Of course, fish! Lots of tench (some little ones, some bigger), carps (common carps and mirror carps), grass carps and several Russian sturgeons. The last ones are like an experiment but I hope that they would survive.











8th November, some pictures. Water level has raised but anyway there should be more.




18th November, some pictures. After some rainy days…








Soon it started to snow and cold days came. In winter no pictures were made. None are made this year… I hope that fish feel OK because aerator was used during the winter and that little brook didn’t stop flowing.

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Welcome to the forum Grundulis great job on your posting skills with all your info and pictures. Nice pond and surroundings. What's your water level like now? How bigs the water shed? How much precipitation annually in that area? Do you live close to the pond ?


"I think I have a nibble" Homer Simpson

34ac natural lake



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Many questions smile

Water level now is a bit more than in the last picture. We are not planning to raise its level this year because of these trees and bushes. This winter they will be down. Then next spring/summer we have to remove top soil in same places and improve dam in one places (that's visible in pictures).

I'm not sure that I understand the term "water shed"... maybe you could explain it? Does it mean area that give water to pond?

About precipitation. Average rain rate for Latvia is 600-700 mm per year. I guess that my region doesn't differ much from it. But I have to add that melting snow is another water source.

Sad but usually I'm very far from this pond but I try to to visit it each time it's possible. Soon I'm having a vacation and I'm going to be there again smile
My relatives live quite close to the pond and they watch after the fish and son on.

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Yes that is what I was talking about when we say watershed how big of an area does the water funnel to your pond from.

We only get around 300 - 400 mm in including snow here. Almost all the runoff comes from snow and our rains mostly just soak into the soil and don't flow much.


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Have you caught any fish that you Stocked yet some looked to be catchable size at stocking time


"I think I have a nibble" Homer Simpson

34ac natural lake



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It's a very hard question actually. Look at this sketch:


The bottom one is another pond. It gets water from rain and probably from ground too. Unnecessary water flows to another smaller pond. It's connected to the largest one. So - 2 ponds, rain, snow... who can calculate something? laugh

I haven't even tried to go fishing. They aren't ready for it. Mostly they are little ones but I don't want to harm the larger ones because I hope they would breed this spring/summer(larger tenches).
If not this year then next year it will happen.

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I really like your idea of removing water using that water control structure. Here's a company in the USA that does something like that:
http://www.agridrain.com/watercontrolproductsinline.asp


www.hoosierpondpros.com


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I really don't understand why such or similar system isn't often used by forum members. I watched numerous reports here but mostly I found simple spillway with pipe to avoid too much water. Nothing more.

I understand that it costs more but I'm sure it might be useful sometimes.
Advantages:
1)drain the pond if you want to clean it;
2)drain the pond to get rid of unnecessary fish, animals and reptiles;
3)raise or lower water level to make better places for fish to spawn roe.

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Grundulis,

We installed an agri-drain system on one of our ponds. They are plastic, but much like the concrete one you constructed. We placed the unit on a concrete pad and anchored it down with rebar (otherwise it would float).

We are in South Dakota, and so we will get up to 1 meter of ice in the winter. This has wreaked havoc with the unit over time, pulling the unit away from the tube that is attached at the base. We've also had the ice distort the shape of the unit. Thus I am going to take it out and replace with a vertical tube, and then fill around the tube with clay, essentially making an addition to the front side of the dam.

With your system I would be cautious about having ice moving in the spring. If your pond is very big, you might have ice slabs moving with the wind during spring melt. This could easily bend over or even destroy the structure. If you are in this situation, I would be tempted to fill around the lower part of your structure with clay or rocks. You'd give up some ability to drop water levels to the very bottom, but if it's either that or having the entire structure destroyed, I'd pick the former.

Bill

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BillSD, my pond isn't a see or even a lake. When ice is melting, I haven't seen drifting ice slabs. Everything happens slowly. So, it's not a danger. By the way, we don't have such thick ice as you. Like I said, ~0,50 - 0,60 m is considered to be a thick ice.
There are only 2 things to worry about:
1)ice could lift the whole system - I hope that concrete base is big and heavy enough to provide stability. The weight of it should be sufficient to avoid that.
2)concrete will start crumbling in water level. You know how does it happen. Water gets into concrete in autumn and after freezing its molecules increase their size, ruining concrete. But this happens slowly and concrete chimney can be repaired.

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Welcome. Nice work. The system is called a flash board riser system. They are used some here. There are lots of different systems. See this link.

http://citrusbmp.ifas.ufl.edu/Workshop%20Presentations/Water%20Control%20Structures.pdf
















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Grundulis,

I love the pond. The thing that sticks out most in my mind is if you didn't say it was Latvia, I'd have thought it was anywhere in the US. I love your water control system.

The sturgeon are going to be awesome? What is the temperature range you could expect your pond to experience over the season? As in what would be the high for the year in particular as I would guess the pond will freeze over for at least a portion of the winter. Sturgeon are not quite as sensitive to water temperature and dissolved oxygen levels, but they do require fairly cool water and higher DO's, especially when larger. Not as familiar with Russian sturgeon, so I am not sure if they are more or less sensitive. A quick research on them shows they will reach 6' and 250 pounds but are slow growers... From what I understand, sterlets are one of the most tolerant of warmer waters and lower DO's. All species require moving water to reproduce so you can expect them to not multiply in the pond.

I have heard tench are very good fighters when caught on light tackle and you can't have a European pond without different varieties of carp! The one thing that seems to be missing are higher end predatory fish... Is there plans to stock any? Zander, pike, European perch, or another species I am not familiar with? Would the water stay cool enough and oxygenated enough year round for trout?

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Originally Posted By: CJBS2003
Grundulis,

The sturgeon are going to be awesome? What is the temperature range you could expect your pond to experience over the season? As in what would be the high for the year in particular as I would guess the pond will freeze over for at least a portion of the winter. Sturgeon are not quite as sensitive to water temperature and dissolved oxygen levels, but they do require fairly cool water and higher DO's, especially when larger. Not as familiar with Russian sturgeon, so I am not sure if they are more or less sensitive.


I can't tell you much about water temperature because it may vary a lot. Last 2 winters were very cold and summers hot but some years before winters were like late autumn. This year spring isn't as warm as is should be... Giving the max. and min. temperature wouldn't tell us much.
The purchase of these sturgeons was inspired by some private pond owners. Somehow their fish survive... Right now, when pond is only with 1/3 of it's possible water amount, sturgeon might feel not comfortable but probably 4-5 m depth would provide good living condition. But, as I said, it's only an experiment smile

Originally Posted By: CJBS2003

A quick research on them shows they will reach 6' and 250 pounds but are slow growers... From what I understand, sterlets are one of the most tolerant of warmer waters and lower DO's.

What I don't like about sterlets - their max. possible size is tiny compared to sturgeon and that means they probably would grow slower... And I don't think that Russian sturgeon is such a slow grower. Theoretically it may reach 10 kg weight in 4-6 years (in good living conditions). Fishkeeper that sold our these baby sturgeons told that his fish grew from 0,2 to 2 kg during one year (Of course, he fed them). In fact, it can be true as Russian sturgeon is the second biggest fish from sturgeon family (1st place - beluga).
By the way, sturgeon is only gaining popularity right now and only few fishkeepers offer to buy their fry. I've never seen and ad offering sterlets. But I think that it's only a matter of time.

Originally Posted By: CJBS2003
Grundulis,
All species require moving water to reproduce so you can expect them to not multiply in the pond.

I know that...:(

Originally Posted By: CJBS2003

I have heard tench are very good fighters when caught on light tackle


Yeah, it's so. Tench is one very good fish even from other points of view. It tolerates water with low oxygen level, no problems with reproduction, it's very tasty and beautiful fish. But... it grows slow frown
Originally Posted By: CJBS2003
The one thing that seems to be missing are higher end predatory fish... Is there plans to stock any? Zander, pike, European perch, or another species I am not familiar with? Would the water stay cool enough and oxygenated enough year round for trout?


You are right. Actually there is no need for them now but I will stock some. The only problem is that I can't decide what species should be the best ones.
Pike - works well but grows very fast and eats much. If they manage to spawn eggs then goodbye carps laugh
Zander - would be better but it's very wayward fish. Probably won't live together with carps because very clear water is a must.
Perch - they won't grow big (1 kg fish is considered large; Latvian record perch ~2,1kg) and they spawn like hell.
There are other not so popular fish that can also be used as predators - wels catfish (grows very big and eats much), burbot (doesn't spawn in such ponds), eel (slow grower), chub (don't know where to get it - nobody sells them. The only way is to catch them by myself).
About trout. Here in Latvia only rainbow trout is used as pond fish (golden trout is a subspecies of rainbow trout). There are no problems with getting them but I'm not sure how they would act in summer. Now it's pointless to buy them because of low water amount but after full construction of pond it could be more realistic. But there is another BUT.
I'm worried about different animal predators. We have caught at least 2 otters, 2-3 minks and one heron is seen sometimes. Thanks god, there are no gannets here... Rainbow trouts from upper water are easy catch even for hawks.

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Of the animal predators listed, the otters are the worst of the bunch.


www.hoosierpondpros.com


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Many pond members will measure their pond temp at different depth daily or at least a couple times weekly. If done over an entire year, you can a good temperature range over the seasons. Although you may have an unusually cool or warm year, you start to see what your temps run and can decide which species may or may not do well in your pond.

I think of wels catfish as the European equivalent to our blue cats but maybe even more aggressive and they get a bit bigger. Seems like predatory fish are really lacking in Europe? Not many options to pick from... Maybe just a couple of pike of the same sex to control them but to prevent reproduction may work? There is a forum member from Austria on here who occasionally posts. He was able to source some North American largemouth bass for his pond. I wonder if they would be legal for you to stock if you could find some?

I would assume carp spawn just as successfully in Europe as they do here and if so, you're gonna have a pile of carp in a hurry. Tench are prolific spawners as well.

Originally Posted By: esshup
Of the animal predators listed, the otters are the worst of the bunch.


Agreed! Are you able to trap or shoot otters in Latvia? The others will take a few fish, but the otters really can wipe a pond out.

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I like your approach of measuring temperatures and making charts and reports but here our actions are based mostly on experience. It's not hard to say whether carp or pike would live in such pond (most of lake fish would live there without problems). Temperature measurements can be useful when sensitive fish like trout. It might be useful to predict when fish would spawn.
But even if you know possible temperature range in pond, you can't be sure about future. What if summer comes hot as hell?

About carp spawning. Latvia is a bit too cold for them and in wildlife they spawn only in several lakes where they can find a shallow places with warm water and lots of plants. But it's possible to stimulate their spawning in this pond by raising water level and flooding a part of meadow. They like such places smile

Seems like our wels catfish is much bigger that your blue catfish. As I looked in Wikipedia, world record for that fish is 130 lbs. It's about 60 kg only. I have heard rumours about wels weighing more than 100 kg. Anyway this fish can't be really used as succesful fish capacity controller in such small pond.
I can't say that we don't have other predators here. Lets think...
Pike;
Eel;
Chub;
Ide;
Burbot;
Perch;
Zander;
Asp;
Rainbow trout.
I didn't mention salmon, sea trout, brown trout, grayling and some more that wouldn't live in a pond like this.

So, there is a list to choose from. Of course, not all of them can be obtained easily. I haven't heard about any fish farm that could offer ide, chub or asp. Probably the only way to get these is by usual fishing rod (it's not prohibited to transport fish to your pond. Just don't release them to other lake in wildlife). Never heard about largemouth basses here but even if I wanted some, I wouldn't be able to get them...
Once I thought about same sex pikes as the only suitable solution but I have to learn a bit about their gender differences. Imagine a little mistake and full pond of small pikes laugh

Otters are protected by law but I hope that this law will be changed soon. Even hunters admit that their capacity allows them to be taken out of endangered animal list. But anyway I don't care about these stupid laws and at least 2 otters have been killed with traps during some last years. Traps are the only way to get rid of them - I have never seen an otter near the pond. They are careful.... You can't shoot animal that you don't see laugh

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Originally Posted By: Grundulis
Traps are the only way to get rid of them - I have never seen an otter near the pond. They are careful.... You can't shoot animal that you don't see laugh


Unless you have traps and nightvision snipers 24-7 the best way to keep otters out is an electric fence, they don't appreciate 8000 volts. grin The only drawback is during winter when heavy snow covers the fence. There's always a chance a Heron could airdrop an otter into the pond. laugh


Last edited by adirondack pond; 05/27/11 01:51 PM.


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But how much such fence could cost? And what about use of electricity?
This year electricity rates raised a lot.... frown
By the way, 8000 volts - are you kidding?

Uh, almost forgot to tell you about beavers. Latvia is overpopulated by these oversized rats... they don't eat fish but they ruin ponds by building dams, dragging trees into pond and so on... some of them are caught by traps but they multiply faster than can be killed.
Now they aren't under any protection (except time when they have young ones) but it doesn't help.

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Grundulis the fence charger, wire and plastic pipe cost me less than $200 dollars to do the pond, It uses almost no electricity, just a couple of watts to keep the fence charged, and maybe a few when a critter decides to test it. The 8000 volts is low amperage, it won't hurt you but sure will get your attention. grin
You can also get fence chargers that are battery operated with a solar charger.
The fence should also keep out beavers.

If you want to see how effective they are look on you tube, there are videos of fences repelling grizzly bears, but the best videos are of DUMB people peeing on an electric fence. shocked

Last edited by adirondack pond; 05/27/11 04:13 PM.


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Yeah, I have a solar powered fence that I think is good for a couple of miles. The only way I've ever tested was with my hand.


It's not about the fish. It's about the pond. Take care of the pond and the fish will be fine. PB subscriber since before it was in color.

Without a sense of urgency, Nothing ever gets done.

Boy, if I say "sic em", you'd better look for something to bite. Sam Shelley Rancher and Farmer Muleshoe Texas 1892-1985 RIP
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Use a pliers and touch the handle to the post and wire at the same time. If it sparks, its working.

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A quick touch is a lot faster and really does not hurt.

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This is what I use to test the fence at different points, the graduated lights tell you how much voltage you have at that point, it saves alot of funky dancing. grin
http://www.mastergardening.com/tes-1040.html?gclid=CImQ-PrPiqkCFYLc4Aodog58og



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