Pond Boss Forums POND CONSTRUCTION Creating habitat Christmas trees placed

With ice on the pond and a decent day (finally), I got the xmas trees in what I hope is the right, or at least a good place.

My reasoning for placing them there:
Lack of structure in pond for BG to escape predation from LMB and HSB.
Near BG beds.
4' depth (avg depth in that area) leading to deeper water (8-9')
Creating a highway from (nearby) beds to deeper water.
For fishing it's reachable from the shore, yet I can still get the boat on the inside of them.
Near feeding area (took pictures from dock).
Lastly, hopefully it will attract the remaining BCP in the pond for culling

As the ice will be safe for maybe this week, please share any thoughts or ideas as to a better way or better place to put them, unless I HAVE learned something and it looks ok .

BTW, the pond is 2 acres in size so this is just on one end and only one of many spawning areas.

Thanks in advance!

Hey, Keith. You sound like you've thought this out pretty well. I would only suggest that, if you decide to install a fish feeder at some point, it might be smart to have it placed so that this same area gets the pellets.

Hey Keith, it looks great so far.
Have you thought about anchoring the base of the tree with cinder block/bricks/or rocks so that when it hits the water it doesn't float to long or fall out of position?
I like that idea of creating a 'wall' or highway to deeper water but if the land slopes beneath them, they may not sink in the line you want without some weight...just a thought.

How will they stay in place when the ice starts to move ?

May want to tie a rope (small nylon string) to them and stake them to shore so they don't move off a bunch.

ewest has good points. Those trees will move and float to shore depending on wind direction when the ice melts. If you want them deep you will need to weight them down. Best overall position for evergreens like that is vertical placement with bases on the bottom. See pictures in the Archives Structure thread. Scroll down on the 1st page to date of 29-07-07 to see pictures of how x-mass trees are placed.
http://forums.pondboss.com/ubbthreads.php?ubb=showflat&Number=92463#Post92463

Thank you all for your replies and I apologize for not mentioning that there are two cinder blocks tied to each tree which will lay them horizontal when the ice thaws.

Laying them horizontal was intentional due to the pond being only about 4' deep in that area and I would prefer they stay submerged.


The trees are just out of feeding range (photo taken from the dock where I toss feed), unless I were to spread them farther apart, bringing the first one closer to feeding range, or I can always add a few tress to get them closer.

This is one of the decisions I had to make on how far apart to space the trees. My thought was to keep them fairly close together to escape/avoid predation.

Keith, not sure I understand. What do you want to escape predation? If baby or small fish, they or others need to be right near the shoreline. Your LMB will use those for staging areas and to clobber anything that ventures out.

That's a great point, Dave thank you!

So really all I'm doing is adding cover or as you point out, a staging area for predators?

With my objective being two-fold, fishing being first and foremost, I also wanted a place for baby and small fish to hide or "escape predation" so they have a better chance to grow to a size the LMB and HSB can benefit from. So with hat being said, would I be better off adding more trees so they are making a trail or "highway" beginning from the shoreline? Otherwise, as you state, good luck getting from the shoreline cover to the xmas tree highway!

So now that I've overthunk this whole venture I wonder if the following would be better:

Place half of the trees (or add more and leave what I have there?) sporadically near the shoreline, near spawning areas. And place the other half in more strategic areas as cover for fishing i.e., near ledges, deep zones, etc.

And one last thought as I'm still removing BCP (around 3000 since 4-13), would the trees in the above photo be a good "attractant" for them?

If not, what exactly have I accomplished?

Okay, I'm all over the place now, and beginning Thursday the ice will become less and less safe and I really want to be sure I'm getting the best use out of these trees!

Thanks again for bringing this up (I think )

Keith

LL you are on track with your plan for tree placement for protection of young BG. See pic below for an example. This tree is tied to a post in a little deeper water but is only about 20 ft from a spawning area.

Xmas trees work well for BG cover from predation.

Dwight and I tried placing 100+ trees in a row on top of the ice right were he wanted them. When the ice broke up it moved the trees all over the pond. Hopefully this will not happen on your pond. On a side note, having the pines scatter was ok, they still do their job!

Ewest, thanks for the reassurance! The picture you posted is one of many I saw from researching and from the very informative link you provided, which is why I went the direction I did, so thank you!

What Dave brought to light, though still wouldn't be a bad idea, having a few submerged trees near the shorelines of each of the spawning areas, and after reading more, dropping a few down in the deeper area near structure (drop-offs and ledges).

Dwight, I do have two cinder blocks tied to each tree so I'm fairly confident they won't move too much, but that's not saying much for me

If you place trees in the future in deeper water for crappie angling I would place them vertical. The taller structures with some space below for fish movement underneath has been shown to be the most effective.

LL I agree - lots of potential uses based on goals.

Bill, I have fell several trees around the pond, most of those into shallow water from the shore and they've been great for fishing LMB and BG, but the one on the dam that fell into deep water is by far the honey-hole for crappie (and I know it's not resting on the bottom of the pond). So I can certaily attest to that being effective!

I've also made 3 PVC trees (deployed 8-2014) which are submerged vertically at each deep end and one in the middle of the deep water at the dropoff, so it'll be interesting to see what's hanging around those this year!



It would be an understatement to say I'm ready for Spring!

Thank you all for your input and comments!

Keith, over 95% of the eggs that are laid, hatched, etc will be eaten. And that is as it should, has to be. That's just the predator/prey relationship working and avoids oxygen depletion.

What I've found to be the most efficient is a string of cedar or XMAS trees extending from deeper water to shoreline. Then some more in shallow water along the shoreline. This creates an efficient fish highway, cover for smaller fish and a comfort zone for escape to deeper water. Most will still get picked off but will allow enough to live so they will grow.

I'm loaded with cedar and have dropped some larger trees that I drag to the pond and use.

I agree with DD1 and have used that approach successfully for years.

Here is a note by Bob (about time , protection and survival) which should be of interest.


One important factor that hasn't been discussed is just how dynamic a fishery is. With the "best" habitat for bluegill, for example, baby fish are allowed to live for a longer time, gaining mass from plankton and insects. They quickly grow from 10,000 per pound to 30 per pound, if they have enough habitat and cover for safety. That extrapolates to more bass, which shifts "carrying capacity" to target species. If you were able to analyze Bruce's male only bluegill pond(s), you would find a few giant bluegills and millions of large insects. His "carrying capacity" is tied up in totally different living forms than multi-species, mult-size fish populations.

The trees have successfully sank!

From this:


To this