So... Four y/o new pond upstate NY about 1/2 acre. 14ft deepest, at least 10ft for half. Some shallow area less than 1ft with grasses and some cat tail starting. Didnt do much for habitat but rock piles boulder clusters. Some wood debris and small trees falls in there. Good shoreline grasses.
So I'm am not interested in managing a fish population, or feeding them. Tbh I don't fish but I friends and their kids that do so I thought just "throw some stuff in". I know. Not good. Heres what I've done.
Year 1 I added fat heads and shiners. They populated really well. Theres a population of what we think are pumpkinseed sunfish that came in from another pond I used to partially fill this one. By year 2, also Lots of turtles and water snakes, and bullfrogs tadpoles. Fall year 2 I added 50 perch (2-3 inches), but they disappeared and I never saw them, and year 3 and the pond had a stable mix of sunfish, minnows, turtles and snakes.... Nothing overpopulated. This this year 4, we saw a perch ribbon in the spring and to my surprise our friend just caught one to, about 7-8 inches, so I guess they were there hiding all year 3! Now, in year 4, my friends just rehomed some bass in it - 6 largish ones 1-1.5 lbs, and 10 small ones like 6 inches. I imagine those large bass are going to pretty much fill up on all the goodies. My wife is worried they'll eat the painted turtles and baby snappers- that's what she likes.
So, without management or feeding, any predictions on this mess will evolve into. Pond seems healthy with plankton and color. People like to swim in it. Will it overpopulate with stunted fish of some sort, and or will populations find a balance of some sort? What do people predict? As for management, my friends could come over and harvest some fish if that needed? I do have an aeration system I have not installed yet, and I'm on the fence about installing it or not. The pond freezes over pretty hard in winter and we skate on it. What difference will adding bottom diffusion make?
Thanks for any thought you all have!!!
