Bought a seine for my 1/4 acre trout pond, and was wondering if any of you folks have some experience and/or advice.
The pond is oval-ish in dimensions, about 55' across by 90 feet long. Steep, stone-lined sides to a flat clay bottom. 9 feet deep.
The seine is 70 feet long, 12 feet high. Floats on the top, lead weights on the bottom. 1/2 inch mesh, and a 10x10x12 pocket in the middle - top to bottom of the seine.
Purpose of the seine is to see what the heck has happened to about 250 trout I've put in at various times over the last three years. I've caught around 40. There's been predation. Mink and cormorants were the worst. In a small pond like this, my observation is that the trout get hook-shy and smart, quick. But I've fed with good quality pellets, there was always reasonable surface feeding action, good aeration, and some of the trout taken were over 20 inches. So I have reason to hope!
Advice I'm looking for would be any of the following.
1) Speed vs care? I've got field stones stacked along the side, and with some bigger stones fallen on the bottom. Plus I left one edge to grow cattails (but edged top to bottom with stone covered weed barrier to prevent them taking over). So I won't be able to get a 'vacuum seal' during the seine. Can I just do a nice clean sweep, or do I need a wet-suit, mask, and fins to carefully seal all the gaps as I go...? This sounds problematic, so I'm wondering what you all think.
2) Minimizing stress on the fish? Assuming I get a fair quantity in the net, I assume I should quickly process (count them) and sort them, with minimal handling. But any advice would be appreciated.
3) Time of day, time of year? I've heard cooler weather is best, so with ice just off the pond I was gonna do it now. Before putting more in from the hatchery.
Other advice? Should I post photos?
