Pond Boss Forums GENERAL QUESTIONS Help One more time with feeling

It has been six years since my last post. I left discouraged after a phone call with TJ concerning my .9 acre leaking pond. I hoped a dry surface application of Soilfloc would solve my leaking pond. He diagnosed my problem as general soil porosity and not the target application for Soilfloc. I appreciated his professionalism and advice. Having spent mucho dinero on prior attempts, including 270,000 pounds of Texas Sodium Bentonite, I hung my head and accepted that I would never have the pond I wanted.
Now six years older and six years grumpier I am back.
Thanks to an understanding spouse of 56 years, Bend Tarps & Liners in Bend, Oregon and Donnie Metcalf from Johnson City, Texas I now have a new liner in my pond.
BTL shipped the 4600-pound one-piece liner to Fort Worth. It was too heavy for lift gate delivery, so I rented a tilting-bed auto hauler trailer and picked it up and hauled it to my farm near Morgan Mill,TX. Using my skid steer, chains and the tilting trailer I unloaded it myself.
What followed was weeks of pond reshaping and water(mud) pumping preparing for liner installation. Local dirt guy Blu Caylor helped and dug the anchor trench around the perimeter at full pool level. Donnie Metclaf and his two helpers installed the liner in one day. Blu covered the anchor trench and about twenty feet into the pond with 12 inches or so with topsoil.
I was able to reinstall my aeration system. Now I'm patiently waiting for spring rains to fill the pond and reestablish the grass to limit shore erosion.
I need help finding a supplier for fathead minnows and BG and RE sunfish. I used to buy from Arms Bait & Fish Supply in Dublin, TX but according to the internet they are permanently closed. I am hoping to find a supplier near Stephenvile, Mineral Wells, or Granbury, TX. Any help from you guys will be appreciated.
Thanks for keeping Pond Boss relevant and valuable and thanks for helping convince my wife that I'm not the only pond addict out there.

Give the Pond Boss Office a call tomorrow. They should be able to point you in the direction of a good fish supplier. (800) 687-6075. Glad to see you back and that is good news about the pond! What thickness liner did you go with?

WAAANTEDD dead or alive

Great effort and best wishes on the journey. Call Bob as he is in that general area.

I bought 30 mil as was recommended by Nolan Wilson at BTL.

Thanks!!

Good to hear you are headed in the right direction now, hopefully with many yrs of enjoyment from your pond.

Now you can focus on spending a ton of money to keep your pond performance up to your expectations!

But they are a ton of fun and fret and entertainment, Enjoy!

Congrats on the new (non-leaking) pond!

I hope your string of years of getting grumpier is soon reversed with some good pond adventures and memories.

I have talked with the Pond King guys about fish genetics and they were very professional. (I have not purchased any fish from them.)

They are in Gainesville, about 1.5 hours away from you.

They carry Copper Nose BG and Hybrid BG (whichever best matches your pond goals). They carry RES and FHMs.

They also have native LMB, F1 Tiger Bass, and Hybrid Striped Bass for when you put a top predator into your pond.

If your pond does not yet have much water, you will probably have to do a fall stocking. You can start the FHMs once you get a few feet of water and are pretty confident you are past the "drought time" of the year.

You might want to start a new thread about stocking your pond. If you include the surface area and the depth of your pond, plus your goals for the pond, there are lots of experts near you in Texas and other experts farther away that can give you some very professional advice.

Good luck on your upcoming pond ventures!

Sunday night's 2+ inches of rainfall filled my newly lined .9 acre pond. FHM now have plenty of room to procreate and grow. Now to adding BG, GSF, LMB from the Paluxy River.

I would be wary of adding river fish into a pond for several reasons.

If one does the literature research, just about every wild fish, esp river fish is infected by some form of the documented parasites for each species.
Examples:
BG - protozoans 9, Trematoda 56, Cestoda 8, nematodes 11, acanthocephalans 5, leeches 6, mollusks 1, crustaceans 12.
GSF - protozoans 4,Trematoda 29, Cesstoda 5, Nematoda 7, Acanthocephala 2, leeches 1, Mollusca 1, Crustacea 4.
LMB - Protozoa 13, Trematoda 45, Cestoda 11, Nematoda 14, Acanthocephala 5, leches 4, Mollusca 1, Crustacea 10.
Reference: Parasites of North American Freshwater fishes. 2nd edition. Cornell Univ. Press 539pp. G.L Hoffman 1999.
https://academic.oup.com/jaah/article-abstract/11/2/198/7826351

I'm used to catching and consuming wild fish from Texas lakes, which are river fed impoundments. Why would there be a greater risk for fish from a river?
Do hatcheries treat breeding fish for parasites?
Since I intend to catch fish one at a time, I can visually inspect for external leeches and such. I intend to be very selective with respect to species, size and condition before adding to my pond. I see more risk buying a plastic bag filled with 1"- 2" fish from a travelling fish truck. My recent experience buying FHM did not fill me with confidence.

Last year a team of graduate students from University of Houston performed an electro-shocking survey of the Paluxy River on my property as part of a greater study of the Texas Brazos River watershed area. They were positively impressed with the quantity and condition of the fish they captured and examined. Their study included DNA analysis back at the university which was aggregated into a larger report for their Biology Dept. doctoral program. I received a copy of that report.

Don't buy fish from a fish truck. Buy from a Pond Boss approved vendor.