Hello trout whisperer, I'm in Jerome MI which is in Hillsdale County. My pond is now about .13 acres and the trout haven't been biting right for about 5 weeks or so, it's what they do. When the weather warms up, the bite goes down, way down. My pond is a bit different then yours though, I am now at 13.5' deep in 50% of my pond and my aerator runs at 8'. I am currently running aeration all day long as well as a 100gpm fountain (I'm actually trying to cool the surface water through evaporation) which only draws from 1.5'. My water temp is 70 degrees all the way to the bottom for the past two weeks.

I quit feeding my trout when the "warm" weather finally stayed. When we got to a few days of 80+ degrees my pond got 78 degrees and I lost two 28" goldens. A few days later I lost a small golden but haven't noticed any others dead since then and haven't lost a fish, that I know of in two weeks or so. I know the trout are still there, they can now be seen hitting an insect from time to time in the cooler 70 degree water.

In your set up, I'm a little concerned about aeration. A windmill aerator only runs when you have wind so is it enough O2 for your pond? I don't know. You have very large ponds compared to mine and I'm attempting to super oxygenate the water at maximum O2 levels which is easier in a small pond. If you throw out a bobber with a simple crawler and wait, even 15 minutes, a trout won't bite?

Where is your pond located? You seem to have good temps at the bottom but if the bottom layer is O2 void, it doesn't do any good. Did your top layer of water get very hot this summer?

I'm a newbie to all this, just put my pond in last year, but have been able to nurse these trout along through this summer and I think they're going to make it for this year. The real experience people will chime in and ask much better questions and have better answers.

I forgot to mention, I started with 50 rainbows and 10 goldens. Rainbows were 14" Goldens were 4 at 20"+ and 6 at 14". If I want a trout right now, I can get one to bite on a crawler but it takes time and you better be ready to eat it because it will probably die after you catch it. Warm water is very hard on trout.

Last edited by timshufflin; 07/30/14 06:48 AM.
I just got a new pond, I made it twice because I aint so bright.