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Over a long time, green sunfish have taken over one of my ponds. It’s about 1/8 to 1/4 acre; and a mile from the house. I don’t live there. But, every time I get a chance, I get on a 4wheeler and go feed them.

About 40 years ago I stocked it with bluegills, fatheads, channel cats and bass. I also trapped some fish from my creek that I thought were bluegills but were actually GSF. Over the years, low water and cormorants have eliminated everything but the greens.

That’s ok. I seldom fish it but on occasion, I drown some worms on a hook. Haven’t caught anything but greens in years.. Mucho heat plus rain shortage have turned it into water for wildlife and a swimming pool for wild hogs.

In this case, the limited spawns of the greens have been a plus to keep the water from being fouled resulting in an O2 shortage.

I still think that the hooked greens outfight a bluegill every time.

Hello fellow Michigander.

Got any pics of your pond? Fish? Unfortunately, this forum is horrible for attaching images. Linking a pic with BBCode from an image hosting site is the best way that I have found.

FA is a problem for sure, and there are lots of posts about it in the forum if you search. Dealing with it really boils down to 3 approaches:

1. Mechanical (rake it out of the pond)
2. Herbicide (Cutrine Plus is a popular product)
3. Biological (stock Tilapia to eat the algae)

Here is a post I started last year that covers my endeavors and touches on all three of these remedies.

https://forums.pondboss.com/ubbthreads.php?ubb=showflat&Number=569653

Sorry about your leak, MadJack.

Too little information to give you any definitive answers.

However, all of that water went somewhere!

If it has not rained recently, then you should probably go examine every single low spot surrounding the pond, and especially below the dam. Look for any wet spots or soggy soil.

If the water did not go through your banks, then it probably went through your pipe. Some failures are sudden. If a bunch of water suddenly rushed through your outlet pipe would there be any evidence in the waterway beyond the exit of the outlet pipe? I would probably check that area.

Do you have any muskrats or beavers at your pond? Beaver damage is usually easy to spot on your trees surrounding the pond. Muskrat activity is usually a little harder to spot. Either varmint can excavate burrows into your dam or the other banks. If they burrowed most of the way through, then the hydrostatic pressure of the water in your pond, may have pushed through the rest of the way and caused a leak.

What is the material for your outlet pipe? Galvanized might be starting to corrode after 26 years and allowed a leak. Are you at enough elevation in Middlebrook to get heavy ice on your pond last winter? Ice pressure can certainly weaken a pipe that is already corroding or loosen a joint.

If none of my suggestions seem valid, then it is probably time to closely examine your outlet pipe. I would put on a decent diving mask and examine the pipe by either swimming or wading. If you can't see well enough, then gently feel around the pipe and see if you feel a cracked joint or some small leaks.

DO NOT SHAKE THE OUTLET PIPE WHILE IN THE WATER. If the pipe breaks at the lowest point, then three feet of water pressure is definitely enough to pin your hand or arm in the hole.

P.S. I have no idea what an "emergency release cap" might be. Usually water going over the dam is the worst possible scenario for a pond, since it may result in a section of the dam washing out and draining the entire pond. One common cause of that is a clogged outlet pipe during a big rain event. Perhaps he installed a threaded cap somewhere along the horizontal run of your outlet pipe that he could screw out in an emergency? If so, then his "wrench extension" to the cap may have rotted away long ago. You might also examine the horizontal run of your outlet pipe if you do end up going in the water.

Good luck on finding and fixing your leak! I was just trying to throw out some ideas that may help you solve the problems since you are the guy with actual eyeballs on the scene.

That's great growth on your panfish, 4CP. Catching 10" BG never gets old.

Seeing your thread also reminds me of Pat's situation with BCP, but in your case it is YP. I think factors are very similar but most important is the economy of the existing populations of lepomis. In real estate they say possession is 9/10 of the law and my grandfather used to say about land "They ain't making any more of it". Essentially, a pond community is an energy economy where the energy (the currency) is limited by sunlight and additional organic input (grown with sunlight somewhere else). Because food (energy) will be limited, it will have to divvied to the most enterprising fish in accordance with their competitiveness for available resources.

Lepomis, are pretty darn competitive and resourceful (due to reproduction) and are quite capable of squatting a big portion of the fixed amount of energy real estate. Just being in there in large numbers and biomass prevents other less competitive species from gaining a larger piece of the pie. Niches help some weaker species maintain a footprint in the mix but without a niche, weaker species are often extirpated. This is why I like Bill's advice so much. Removing the less desired species to open the living space allows the supplemented species to possess that space. Let's say the opposite were true, and most of the space were occupied by YP. In that case, they would release that real estate overtime time to the lepomis. Eventually, the reproduction by lepomis would squeeze the YP share and they would dominate then. These changes take time. But where you want to have more representation of a weaker species, just as you agreed above, overcoming the possession problem can only be accomplished by supplementing the weaker species at sizes large enough to survive predation combined with biomass removal of the less desired stronger competitor. I think from the management perspective, both actions will be required to achieve goals. The good news is that the pond is small enough that the actions are less burdensome than they would be in larger BOWs.

Feel free to reach out anytime with your thoughts. There is a lot I could share that might help and also much that I could learn from you.

Asking similar questions as to what one can expect natural mortality to be, Eric introduced me to paper by TPWD of a 17 year study. After attaining lengths >12", the mortality was much lower when in most years ranged between 5 and 10 percent. As the fish aged, mortality rates also increased. It depends entirely on what you want, but natural mortality will be insufficient to produce trophy fish over time. You plan to cull LMB and will be crucial to success.

On the subject of condition. There were two years in which the average weight of LMB in the study declined. These years were also associated with spikes in mortality. So getting enough to eat is essential for good health and survival.

Fathead minnows not flathead

Cody Note - Flathead is a type of catfish as in flathead catfish.

Yes very common.

Just a little update on this.

Plants came in. Pond megastore did a really nice job; all plants were healthy upon arrival. They are currently in an acclimation period where they sit in water in a bucket in the shade for a few days.

When I plant, I plan to tie them to rocks so they won't float away. Time will tell.

Thank you FishingRod ! I may just resort to catching some myself and just continue to stock Fatheads and Shiners now. The pond at one time had a good balance of prey and predator but last summer with the draught it had a major fish kill . Very few fish survived . Thanks again !

Got a bag of the Professional Pond Blend in 2 days ago.
My BG turned back in to Pirranahs

Unfortunately, the old well is silted in and was just a sand point well. It only had 1 1/4 inch pipe. As Rod stated, It will take a larger diameter hole.

There have been several ponds built upstream that have to fill before I get significant runoff.

I think we also get less rain than we did 25 years ago. When I bought the place one neighbor told me he could not believe someone bought this "Swamp" He'd ran cattle on it for years. I still have no idea why he said that, he lives somewhere in Colorado now. The other neighbors say there used to be more rain and runoff as well.

35" of snow is our average a winter. I'm looking at the Renogy 100ah AGM now. I'm planning on having the low volage disconnect charge at a rate of 14-14.4V and have the disconnect setting at 12.4V. If I'm reading correctly, that is where AGM batteries like to live.

What voltage should I stop the battery charge? 13.4V??
Since I'm going to add a battery is the best route to wire the panels in series or parallel?

Learninboutfish - Let us know how the seining process works for harvesting your catfish. Length, depth and mesh size of the seine will be helpful info.

Thanks TJ. You and Bill took care of me.

Fred185,

Apologies, I'm a little late to the party here (saying spring time is busy in the fish business would be an understatement) but its sounds like Ewest already answered your question. If you wanted to be safe, you could always go with 4 tons/acre in the pond then lime the surrounding ground in the water shed as well. That way as your runoff flows over the ground it can be neutralized and carry some of that lime with it as well. If your rain is acidic and your soil is acidic you definitely have an uphill battle on your hands and you are going to want to lime everything you can lime.

Hello B storm
Just checking in are you still experiencing that ring? My pond rose up about 4 feet last week due to a heavy rain and now I'm loosing about .25 a day. good thing is that back side of damn is dry.

A couple current pricing updates from TN...Purina MVP $ 54.00, purchased 10 bags from Co-op in Decherd TN, it was available for pickup in 10 days...Just ordered 20 bags of Cargill Triton 4512 for $ 34.00 + LTL shipping, final cost $ 47.00 per bag. Cargill has a 20 bag minimum...Both feeds have been eagerly accepted by CNBG.

To add to FishinRod's very good advice, you should carefully read and reread and study the info in the posts of this pond building thread
https://forums.pondboss.com/ubbthreads.php?ubb=showflat&Number=92487#Post92487

The Otter question has me thinking about a game camera though.....I don't see prints, but with a downside bank, they may be just launching and not leaving prints. I'll have to think on that a little. thx.

My spillway runs 6 months out of a year, which is shallow and wide. I have irises and other plants growing in it which act as a blockade for larger fish. The iris make a foundation almost impossible to wash out. But not everyone can do this, especially if there is infrequent water in it for thick rooted plants.

So far I am unaware of any fish that have pale it over.

thank you so much Bill Cody. i am copying your post to put on our community page to try and convince people to listen to the advice from not only myself, but from the lake management company i have reached out to and will be giving a seminar in the very near future. Still have some folks that believe the only good strategy is catch and release, even when the fishermen are reporting too many small bass and not any bluegill, with very limited decent bass.
i have also been pointed the residence to this group to try and educate them on proper lake and pond management.

Yes, she enjoys it. But enjoys the bay fishing more can't get her to stop with reds and flounder. We both are having a blast watching the kiddos enjoy it. Yes, diaper changing machine over here also.

H20fwler - Air temperature and Water cooling after the eggs are laid has little detriment to the developing eggs other than slowing the hatching time. Dr. Dave Willis at SDSU and a graduate student studied the colder water affects on YP egg development and wrote about it in PBoss magazine. Actually the the colder water temperatures did not cause a significant decrease of egg hatching. My pond water temperature yesterday Apr 08 was still around 53F in NW Ohio and similar to and just slightly higher compared to the water temps of most of the egg laying. The main things that will affect egg hatch are increased siltation from watershed runoff that suffocates eggs and the location where the eggs were deposited. Best egg hatch will be if the ribbons were stretched out among old weed stems or hanging on brush or structure where moving water can circulate around the ribbon keeping eggs well oxygenated. Eggs laid in a gathered clump on the bottom has poor egg hatch except for the eggs on the outside edges of the cluster.

jpsdad, here's a picture of my pond. right now I have the Pondmaster 1000 (12 in x 12 in) flat filter which is connected to the intake side of my Danner PondMaster 1200 GPH Pump which sits at the bottom of my pond. The pump sends the water to my 18 inch spillway box. The problem is that I have to remove and clean the filter every other day, which is crazy! So, I'm trying to come up with a different filter system. This is "Trial & Error" for me and I'm posting here looking for ideas because I don't want to keep changing systems and buying new stuff considering how expensive this stuff is!

One thought is for me to use a homemade Bog Filter which would feed my spillway. The problem I see with that is that the pressure from the pump may cause problems with the Bog Filter emptying into the Spillway. The Bog Filter intake will be under pressure from the pump and the outlet from the Bog Filter is Gravity.

So my other option is a larger Spillway/Filter Box instead of using the separate filter. I am looking at the Dinner Pro Line 3000 which is 16" x 18.37" x12.25" and holds 4 Gallons of water. I would use Lava Rock, Bio Balls and Polyfill inside of it.

Which of these sounds like a better option to you?
I am trying to upload a picture now...


Thanks for any feedback!

Bringing this thread back to life.
Since past years has not brought the overpopulation that was forecast. Still have some BCP but not as many as I want due to being eaten or not spawning. Been 11 years since they were put in. This is the first year where weather was possible for spawning. If they pulled off a spawn how long before I would know? The shad perished last year with cold and low water(4’low). Since they migrate after swim up to open water what is best way to see what took place? Fishing or what?