Pond Boss Forums INTRO New Forum Member Introduction Just bought a pond with attached house in SE VA

We just bought a new home with our daughter and her husband in Chesapeake VA with a 2 acre pond. I'm looking forward to years of fishing the pond with my 2 grandchildren.

There is currently a good population of bass, bluegills and shell crackers(Red ear) sunfish. The shell crackers seem healthy, but the bass and bluegills seem light for their length.

There are also a lot of turtles, including at least one large snapping turtle. I'm wondering if the turtles are competing for the same forage as the bluegills.

In any case, I need to establish a stable food chain and perhaps use supplemental feeding in the short term.

Should I actively remove the turtles?

How do I best manage the food chain?

How do I determine the current populations?

Any recommendations for nearby assistance and supplies will be appreciated.

Congrats!, what are you goals for the pond? You can start by trying to get some measurement and weight of the bass and blue gill. You can then compare to the Relative weight charts.

If you are just looking for a balanced pond you probably need to start removing the under weight LMB ( large mouth bass ) , this will give the back bone of the forage , blue gills a change to grow and multiply .

Feeding is another good option, and actually you will find it is just as fun as fishing at times , especially with the kids. Buy a quality fish food and start feeding the same time each day, it should not take long for the BG to start feeding.

Congratulations Don! You have found the best run and most professionally moderated forum of which I have ever been a member. It is literally stuffed to the gills with information including the very technical all of the way down to the stuff that even I can understand. I have made some very great friends here.

As for the turtles - it is your preference but they are certainly not competing on any level with your bass for food.

Good advice from beastman about what you have going on. Take some time to fish, document every fish, and gather the data. (Tell your wife that you HAVE to fish in order to get things on the right track.) Once you have some good data you can present some findings for some feedback.

Use the search feature on the forum to narrow down what you need to read about. There is a panel of experts on here that have spent thousands of hours answering questions that the rest of us learn from.

Again, welcome and enjoy!

The whole turtle thing flips back and forth depending on who you ask. Most everyone is initially concerned with them competing for food. If your feeding and can't stand to see them eat your hard earned money, then removal or reduction in numbers makes sense. Some enjoy seeing the turtles eat the feed and don't mind what little feed they steal from the fish. If your not feeding then the turtles shouldn't be a concern. They serve a good purpose as clean up crew by eating the dead and dying. Not to mention when you hook into a 10 pounder it makes for a good fight AND/OR a lost hook. My opinion is...a few are good to have (especially if you have a variety), nice to watch, and the kids/company enjoy seeing them, but if my pond would get too many I would have to ask myself "Why so many?". I'll cross that bridge if it comes around.

i wouldn't worry about the snapping turtle at all. i actually put 13 babies in my pond yesterday. a friend of mine uncovered them while working for the county on a bridge job. i have stocked about 4 or 5 adults in my pond, but i never see them. i sure wish i had a few huge ones to watch.

i agree with above. start feeding a good food with an auto feeder and culling whatever it takes to achieve your goal. i like big bluegill. so i feed fairly heavy, cull all females i catch, and keep the bass population high.

I agree with what was said. Snappers will walk a LONG ways from pond to pond, so if you take that one out, another might show up. They don't eat that much, and I agree with Bob Lusk. If a snapper catches a fish, then the fish deserved to be caught.

Catch some of the bass, give us the lengths and weights of them.