Will FHMs wipe out the FA in a newly renovated pond?
I ask this because my wife and I can't put our finger on what has removed all of the FA we had on our pond this Spring but what looked like it was about to get away from us has now reversed course and we see absolutely nothing and are loving it.
There are a lot of potential variables involved in tackling the FA, we took a number of actions, but I am just asking about FHM since this is a thread about them. We put about 5.5k FHMs in our about 2.5 acre pond in April. We also stocked BG, RES, 100 CC and 100 2-4" LMB. Our FHM population has exploded in that short amount of time. I really thought the LMB might wipe them out but there are schools of new minnows every step of the way around the banks of the entire pond. It looks like millions to us but obviously not, at least tens of thousands though. I don't fear that the FHM will disappear anytime soon, at least not this first year.
So, is it possible that the initial 5.5k and all their tiny spawn could have been a significant enough influence in the rapid decline of our FA to pretty much zilch or would they have a negligible or zero net effect most likely?
Probably not... In fact it can go the other way if FHM consume large amounts of zooplankton-which consumes the phytoplankton.
The swings from algal growth to clear water is pretty normal the first few years of a new pond at our latitude. There are lots of changes taking place as the ecosystem builds and balances.
