Did a little more fishing in this pond to try and sample the RES to see their progress. Still no RES but I did catch another SMB, this one right at 10" and seemed fat and healthy other than quite a few of the parasites that look like black pepper flakes (forget the name). Can not see them too well in the picture but if you look at the pectoral fin they show up as black dots.
Appear to have good FHM recruitment. At least I think they are FHM. They could be gambusia fry as I did have some gams in this pond last year but I have not seen anything of the adults this year and have seen a number of the adult FHM, so hopefully they are FHM fry. When I put rock around this pond the bank was soft near the water edge and the loader tractor front tires sank in and made some places that held shallow water a number of places around the edge. In every one of these shallow water areas the fry pictured are there. One day I found the fry, the next day went back and found bird tracks (likely Killdeer) and no fry, now they are filled with fry again.
Maybe if I remember when I feed will try to get an aquarium dip net and net some of them. Put them in a glass jar and see if you all can identify them.
