In late spring and throughout the summer our pond has pretty bad aquatic vegetation along the shorelines. We had Pond Boss Guru and Pond Boss founding member Mike Otto out last summer and Mike stated a significant part of the problem was that when our pond was built by the previous owner 6 years ago.. that they didn't slope the shorelines steep enough. In other words our shallow water along our shoreline is a great breeding ground for vegetation growth. Mike said it was inexpensive when you are building a pond to make sure the shore drops off enough to discourage vegetation growth, but that once a pond is built it can be pretty costly to try and dig out the shoreline once a lake is full.

So fast forward to the present. This month we began a log cabin project on the property and decided that it made more sense after renting a backhoe for almost $2500 a month that we would purchase a used one, use it for a year or two and then probably sell it. We bought a used one today with an "extended-hoe".

So...now we will have access to a "free" backhoe and I was wondering if anyone has any experience of digging out their shoreline while the lake is full (or at least almost full) to make their shoreline have a steeper slope?

BTW...don't worry...we wouldn't just jump in and do this without consulting with Mike Otto again, in fact if we do it we'd probably have Mike back out to over-see a day or two of trying to do this. If we try to do it, we also may just do sections and not attempt the entire 4 acre pond shoreline. We thought the property will be kind of a mess with dual cabin construction going on the next 8-10 months, so if the pond was a mess too...it wont really matter.

Has anyone tried this "messy job" and what was the result? Thoughts? Crazy idea? Do-able?

My brother's "new" toy:


Found this on YouTube:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xG4rxvwXN5E


Fishing has never been about the fish....