No Dr Luke, I don't feel any better. At any rate, it's not scat then...it's called a pellet. That word has a more pleasant aftertaste.
Well, the pond has been getting along with aeration from about 11am to 3pm for several weeks now. The water temps have stabilized from top to bottom around the mid 60's which tells me that the air system is turning the pond over sufficiently. Part of me wants to keep increasing the "on" time, but another part of me says good enough is good enough. Not to mention that the pond has been muddy all winter long (9-12" secchi). It recently measured 13", but that's not enough for me to hang my hat on and say it's getting better. It seems that the aeration system may be contributing to the lack of clarity. The previous winter without air the secchi readings got to be 36", this winter...no comparison with only a couple hours of air a day in the shallows. All in all, I am content knowing that the murkiness of the pond has some benefits like FA reduction and it may be a sign of good fertility.
The fish are feeding well on the new size of Optimal and the crawdads have returned to feeding as well. There does not seem to be as many, but maybe they are tending to this years YOY...not sure how that works, but I refuse to think the owls made that big of a dent...we'll see. The HSB have yet to make the big splashes during feeding time that I was accustomed to last year, but the HBG splashes seem to be bigger. I guess they grew some over the winter. I'll catch a few soon to get a baseline for this years growth. The FHM are still there even though numbers seemed to have waned over the winter, but the water temps are still in the 60's and it's hard to see much through the murk.
Plans this year are too start trapping the YOY HBG to access their recruitment, add some more HSB (about 6 or so)for ladder stocking, and start removing any HBG that get to be decent pan frying size (females if recruitment seems high).
Here's to a new pond year!
