Pond Boss Forums MANAGING AN EXISTING POND Fertilization Frustrated with getting bloom

JW points to a likely cause to lack of dense bloom. Likely there is water movement in and out of the sand pit. Moving water will dilute the fertilizer. To really be serious about getting a bloom one should weekly test the nitrate and dissolved phosphorus (soluable - orthoP) to monitor the concentrations to see how long the nutrients stay high enough for bloom conditions. The alkalinity of 40mg/L is marginal for producing good dense blooms.

IMO your best option for growing really good BG-LMB is to establish a good pellet feeding plan. Best is one fish feeder per acre, although localized hand feeding will work; just not as well as 4-5 auto-feeders. Then monitor and manage properly the fish numbers to achieve your specific goals. Harvest of fish numbers that you use will vary depending on your specific goals. 3 basic goals are: trophy panfish, trophy bass (predator), overall general fishing with good representative numbers of fish in all year classes which generally means most numbers in the youngest and fewest in the oldest individuals.

When you fertilize or feed pellet feed be prepared to properly harvest enough fish to keep the fishery goal balanced. Too many fish end up eating too many pellets that gets expensive and degrades the good water quality.

Do you have a depth contour map of the gravel pit? Is establishing desirable submerged plants a possibility to naturally compete against filamentous algae?