If given a choice I always prefer the smallmouth bass for swimming ponds. Although largemouth work okay for many swimming ponds in my area. The only down side to using the bass that I've found is they eat a lot of the tilapia babies and it is the army of tilapia baby fish the eat the most filamentous algae for the owners of a swimming pond. So we have been dramatically reducing the bass numbers by harvesting in the swimming pond.
Windblown leaves will be your biggest problem. It is for ponds in my area. Reducing fertilizer usage on the water shed is critical. Look into buying an extendable handle smelt dipping net with 3/16" to 1/4" mesh. It is a great leaf skimmer. The one that I use has an 11ft 3in handle and overall length of 13ft. Anything else you can use to remove leaves before they sink will be very beneficial.
Those are the three best underwater pond plants that I know of for swimming applications. They will not spread fast which is a pro and con. To get more quicker benefit, plant more in more areas. Be advised that ducks, geese, and turtles will want to eat your plantings. Discourage them until plants are well established. If your homework and discussions with other natural swimming pond people arrive at other pond plants, check with me for a 2nd opinion of pros and cons before planting.
The pond when new with small planted areas will often have its fewest or lowest nutrients of the annual nutrient budget of the pond. From year one, more nutrients are constantly accumulating due to annual inputs, thus more plants want to grow. The trick is to channel the growth into beneficial low work plants. Often new ponds will get a surge of filamentous algae growth. It is best IMO to allow it to grow, eventually float and remove it and its absorbed nutrients with the smelt/algae/leaf net. Killing the algae in the pond sends the biomass and nutrients to the sediments to be recycled for more plant growth later.
Last edited by Bill Cody; 09/03/13 08:45 PM.
