Apparently tilapia will eat muck, as long as it is decomposing plant matter with aerobic bacteria doing their thing.
My hypothesis is that you need to get both tilapia and oxygen into contact with that muck. That'll be a trick without aeration, because most ponds stratify so that only the top 4-8 feet contain adequate oxygen.
Why not hold off on stocking CC this fall, and instead stock Tilapia next May? Tilapia will reproduce like crazy in the absence of predators, and probably be OK with temperatures in the pond from April to November. You'll be able to slowly draw down the pond over the course of next year, perhaps using siphoning every week or two so that the pond falls at a steady rate of roughly two feet per month. This will put all of the pond into contact with both oxygen and tilapia. Once the pond has been at about four feet for a few weeks, you could probably go ahead and catch as many tilapia as possible to remove organic matter.
More experienced folks, would this work?
Last edited by txelen; 07/19/10 06:24 PM.
