I've been reading the forum for several months to gain knowledge and acquaint myself with the issues you face as a pond owner. I bought 12 acres of land 7 years ago and built a house on it. Part of the appeal of this land was the apparent springs which formed a small creek in a ravine in the back of my property. The 'springs' issue will be for another topic. My question I would like to ask is 'How does pond shape affect the fish yield or carrying capacity of a pond. As I understand it, the bulk of the fish and the accompanying food chain reside in a band around the pond. Having a large amount of deeper, open water in the middle doesn't necessarily support a lot of fish especially in a LMB/BG pond. So a 1 acre pond that is 210' x 210' square would not have as much prime fish supporting water as a 1 acre pond that is 441' x 100'. Is that a correct assumption? Maybe it has no real world effect at all. Sometimes when you think about your dream to much you over analyze things. The reason I'm asking, is my potential pond site would be damming a 'ravine'. The shape would be long and narrow, maybe not even the 100' wide mentioned above. The shoreline on each side would be a bench approx 10-25' wide sloping to 5-6' deep with what is now the ravine bottom making a deep trench down the middle of the pond another 12' deeper and 15-25' wide. The main goal of my pond would be to support good eating, and I'm curious if the fish yields I've read in this forum would vary any according to the shape of the pond.

If you can understand what I'm trying to ask, I would appreciate any response you can give.

Tim