Great advice! Very specific and extremely helpful.
It hadn't even occured to me to give them a place to lay eggs, then yank them out before they hatch. Monitoring those habits will also help me identify their favorite sides of the pond for laying out eggs, and I can use that info for adjusting the spawn rate in future years.
I guess the only thing that I have that might contradict this plan is that the water has actually been clearing up quite a bit lately...plus in addition, I layed down straw along the slopes of about half my shoreline and also in the more heavily-eroded areas to be a little bit proactive in minimizing erosion in the spring. I was going to add a well this summer to keep the water topped off, but due to the possible depth and the need for a bigger electrical wire (man, copper is expensive these days!), I had to put that project off for a bit. If all goes well financially, I plan to add my well as soon as the area is dry enough to drive on next spring. That will hopefully top off the pond faster so I don't get so much silt runoff from the inner slopes, and I will also be able to water the spotty grass in the area around the pond, helping filter out some of the silt coming in from around the pond as well. I guess I'll just have to spend more time swimming this summer to muddy up the water more.
