Pond Boss Forums POND CONSTRUCTION Creating habitat My habitat

Thanks for showing us your interesting new MI pond. Your habitat is a very good start. Be sure to mark the underwater structures so you can easily locate them 3-5+ yrs later. After 3-5 yrs the Xmas trees will be relics of only the trunk and largest now bare branches. Wood decomposes surprisingly fast under water. It would be a good idea to put some tree-brushy area close to each SMB spawning bed if you are interested in promoting recruitment of the smallies. Keep in mind that 15%-25% of the pond shoreline is considered optimum habitat area as the best amount of production habitat for a quality sport fishery. As an example 186 ft length of one entire shoreline of a square 0.8 acre pond is 25% of the total shoreline length. Be sure to keep us updated about your northern pond with the success of the smallies and supporting fishes.