Pond Boss Forums POND CONSTRUCTION Selecting a site Pond area

Can some one explain the difference in pond acres, and surface acres. I had always thought if you cover an acre area with water that was considered a 1 acre pond? Is this correct? And how does this apply to stocking ratios?

As far as I know, one acre of surface area is a one acre pond. Of course the health of the pond will depend on it having the right mix of depths for your area. An acre-foot of water is one acre, one foot deep, if that is the source of the confusion.

I was concerned with stocking ratios. I wondered if a ponds population (biomass?) will depend on depth. A 1 acre pond with a 4-8 ft. deep would not have the same biomass as a 1 acre pond with average 8-12 ft. depth, and so on with depth. Keeping in mind the health of the pond, fertility, ph, and other factors I'm wanting to learn more about, would be more of a factor.

While it's true that aeration will increase the available water for fish to survive in, it's a good idea not to push the limit in regards to carrying capacity. Fish grow, increasing biomass. Fish spawn, increasing biomass. If you are near the limit in carrying capacity with aeration, and something goes wrong, (power outage, drought and pond size shrinks, etc.) then you could be looking at a lot of dead fish. If the pond is deeper than about 10' - 12', and not aerated, then a thermocline will usually form, and fish can't normally use the water below the thermocline due to reduced O2 levels.

My pond, and other groundwater ponds in this area will vary in size considerably, depending on the moisture that we get from year to year. I feel that the safest bet is to manage the ponds carrying capacity for the least amount of water that I can have in the pond, which is around 5/8 to 3/4 of an acre. The fish just have more water to swim around in when it's full.

There's one member that I know of that is injecting O2 below the thermocline to allow cold water species to live thru the summer in their pond. Nate Herman (n8ly) would be the one to contact for more information on a system like that.

I wonder if you are refering to acre feet? An acre foot is 1 surface acre 1 foot deep. A 1 acre pond that is 5 feet deep would be 5 acre feet.

Thanks guys. I was getting confused with this pond acreage before. All this is new to me on management, even though I have fished for over 40 years. Once restocked an old family pond, only to have family invite everyone over to catch fish. Seen my hard work go out stringer after stringer. But def. got good results putting threadfins in for forage in a small pond. Had a beauty 8 plus LM in there.
Learned about themocline during diver certification. It is miserable cold, and no fish there. While diving in a quarry I seen BG spawning in 22 ft. of water. Couldn't belive it!