Hello everybody, my name is Austin Bennett and I am new to Pond Boss! I am a fisheries biologist for Herman Brothers Lake Management in central Illinois. Nate Herman just opened my eyes to the pond boss forum world (and got me hooked on the magazine subscription!!) and am absolutely in awe of how cool this whole thing is! So I figured I'd start my first few days off with a question for you all to see if anyone has had similar experiences...
Last fall, we stocked yellow perch in a small 1/3 acre pond that was built deep simply for yellow perch, smallmouth bass, and red ear with the occasional walleye for bonus fish. We stocked YP from three different locations (northern Minnesota, Ohio, and Illinois) and so far this summer the pond has been doing great besides the small issue of losing a few fish every week. There have been around 3-5 dead every week on average for a little over a month now. With some of those dead perch we are noticing some yellow fungus appearing on the gills of them. The SMB are doing AMAZING, and the RESF alike. Obviously here in central Illinois, the water is heating up quite a bit. This is most definitely putting a little extra stress on the YP along with it just being a new body of water overall. We have some assumptions of what may be happening, but I would like to throw that out there just to see if anyone has had similar experiences?? I look forward to hearing from you all who might be able to help paint the picture for this lake a little more clearly.
