Pond Boss Forums AERATION Should I aerate? Noob questions winterkill

Hello all
New here....first post.
I just bought a house on the IL/WI border that has a 1/4 acre spring fed pond out back. At the moment, it is stocked with some bass, gills and a few cats. The pond is pretty shallow.....2-3 ft avg with about a 10 x 10 section where there is a sunken tree that seems to be about 7-8 ft. There are no surface weeds and the water is very clear. Also there is usually plenty of wind blowing across the pond.
My question is whether or not i need to get an aerator in order for the fish to survive the winter. If so....what kind and how large? Or do i just need to shovel the snow off the ice?
Sorry for such noob questions but i am new at this and there is alot of confusing info out there.
Thnx for the help and please let me know any other info u may need in order to help out.

Since the pond is small - you can just about eliminate winterkill if you keep about 15% to 25% of the snow off the ice. I don't like the entire pond covered with snow for more than 2 weeks, especially one as shallow as yours. Snow free at 15% is 38'x38' and 25% is an area 50x50 - not all that big of an area to shovel or blow off snow. When removing stay away from the area where the spring enters the pond. That area will naturally have slightly higher DO. A small aerator operating in winter will reduce, but maybe not eliminate the need for removing snow - It all depends.

Amount of organic muck and dead weeds under the ice will affect how long the DO lasts in the water column under complete darkness of 3"-4"+ snow cover.

If you are interested in a low cost aerator to reduce winterkill for your small 1/4 pond see this from the old topics.
http://forums.pondboss.com/ubbthreads.php?ubb=showflat&Number=302075&page=1

Welcome kllrbee!

Were the fish in the pond when you bought the house or did you stock them? Do you know what the previous owners did with the pond?

Thnx guys
The fish were already in there but i suspect the previous owners put them in this year. There is also a creek running alongside the property about 50 ft from the pond. I think they caught the fish in the creek and threw them in the pond.....but i could be wrong.
At any rate, i should mention that there is at least a 2 ft layer of muck at the bottom of the pond. It definitely needs dredging. Not sure if that would affect winterkill though....just thought id mention it.
Im thinking of welding up a blade and attach it to my jeep or tractor via tow ropes in order to dredge. but not sure if thats really plausable. Maybe a heavy duty trash pump?
Looks like i need to do more research....haha.

Well you definitely found the right site for input. These guys will all lead you in the right direction. My thought was for you to repeat what the previous owners were doing but it doesn't sound like that is plausible. So, thats the extent of my ideas and knowledge.

I'm not sure what you had in mind with that jeep but please post some pic's if you build your dredging rig. Before and after it goes into the muck!

That muck underwater is soft and fluffy. Trying to push or pull it out will not be very productive. Most of it will slide around the edges and over the top. Best way to deal with it is draw the pond down, let it dry out then use a track hoe to dip the edges. If it were my pond, and your long term plan, would be to completely drain it, let it dry, for a month or two and get a contractor to deepen and push out all the slop including that in the pond belly. You can regrow very nice fish in two years if you do it corrrectly. See post by ewest for a HSB at 30 months old.
http://forums.pondboss.com/ubbthreads.php?ubb=showflat&Number=306284#Post306284