Pond Boss Forums INTRO New Forum Member Introduction New Pond

Hello everybody, I recently (November 2013) bought a house with a half acre pond approximately 15-20 deep in the middle. Didn't have much time before it froze do anything to the pond. The previous owner said the pond was stocked with bass, catfish, and bluegill. The ice finally melted yesterday and I was out waking the edge of the pond and found about 15-20 dead fish on the bank. They were mostly bluegill and bass but there was two catfish, one being over 24". I didn't know if this was normal with a rough winter or if I had something else to be concerned about. I have never had a pond so I am a total rookie.

Another side note - in December we had a car run off the road and land in the pond. It was in the for about an hour. Didn't know if that could have something to do with it.

Thanks in advance for all the help.

Welcome to the forum!

I think many ponds in the northern part of the midwest will experience winterkills this past (hopefully) winter. There's two things that you can do to prevent that. 1) Reduce the Biochemical Oxygen Demand on the pond 2) properly aerate the pond.

Unfortunately I'm not sure what either of those things are? Do I need to test the water somehow??

We have dead fish also. Long duration of snow covered ice.

Just went out and counted. We have 14 dead bluegill 8 bass and 2 catfish.

ejmunden,

Welcome! I believe esshup means that 1, you should make sure you do not have too many fish in the pond as well as making sure there is not a lot of dead, decaying organic matter in the pond, and 2, that a mechanical aerator can help assure adequate dissolved oxygen for the fish you do have in the pond.

Poke around here on the web site, ask questions, there is a wealth of knowledge here and lots of people dedicated to helping pond owners.

CMM

Thanks for the responses, is there anything I need to do to test the quality of the water??

You should be able to hook up with your county extension office for water quality testing. Or possibly a university? There are others on this forum that can help you with answers on who to contact for testing and what to test for. Seems that the tests are reasonably priced, hopefully all you are dealing with is low oxygen, and not something else.
Good luck!
CMM

You can use readily available water test kits to check water quality, pH balance and alkalinity of water.

Just an update on the pond. I have seen 3 large grass carp in the pond. Will they hurt the pond (eat the fish) or do they help the pond???

If they are really grass carp they eat plant material like submerged water plants. If you have excessive weeds in your pond they are a good thing or if you pond is in balance with weeds they may be the reason you do not have excessive weeds. So they CAN be a good thing.

If they happen to be regular carp (are you sure of the identification?) they are taking up carrying capacity of the pond for a fish that most people do not consider desirable. So for most people would be a negative. A few people do keep regular carp in ponds on purpose, but very few.

Regular carp can be introduced to ponds by accident. For example poorly sorted stocking minnows might have off species. Or if a pond is in a flood plane flood waters can introduce them.

They do look to be grass carp after looking through google image results. The concerning part is that I have not seen any other fish in the pond.