Pond was finished in November and has about 20 natural springs that add about 4 inches each day and have filled it up over the course of 3 months. The springs have managed to come through the 8-12 inches of clay my builder had placed into the pond edges and bottom and looked like little sand volcanos. I have no water loss and the water is a nice blue green color with about 2ft visibility. I have a few small plants coming through from an old pond that was taken out to make the new. At some point I'll add pictures but always seem to be on my work computer that doesn't allow pictures. But posting on a pond forum doesn't seem to be a problem, yet. Pond depth is about 12ft at deepest and a channel runs through the middle up to 5ft in the shallow end. Edges seem to be about a 3/1 drop. My guys that actually built my pond are pond owners themselves so they added humps, shelves, flats and peninsulas through out which was really fun to design. East/West it's about 450ft long and North/South it varies between 90 to 130ft in width. In the shallow end I've added some gravel and I've added 8 fish attractors in different locations throughout the pond made out of cinder blocks and bricks with small holes and lots of pine branches and trees. I have a fish order coming in 2 weeks, 100 Perch 4-6 inch, 100 Perch 6-8 inch, and 50 Perch 8-10 inch. 3000 minnows. 100 Shellcrackers 4-6 inch and I have put in 15 Bluegill 8-9 inch and 250 crayfish. I'll be adding my own bass next year. My goal is to have nice size Bluegill and Perch. I can pretty much change anything around in my order if I need to. Other pond notes: I have zero grass around the pond currently as I'm waiting on it to grow and I have a few flat rocks randomly tossed into the pond but can get as many as needed for free as my uncle owns property along a river with unlimited amounts. I have read many posts on the forum and have found everything very informative. I had already put the gravel into my shallow end, when I read about not making great places for gills to spawn if I want big gills, so anymore of that type of info would be very helpful before I do anything else to the pond. I just like the crayfish so those guys will stay. Plus when I add the bass, I'm assuming they will take care of the crayfish. I have about 20 Eelgrass starts coming soon, so I will plant that around the pond. I was gonna put in white amurs but have since decided against that until I have a problem with weeds. I'm in northern OH if that matters. I have no aeration set up as the springs tend to flow always. I had the pond last summer before they put in the clay and the springs shot in cold water all summer and I only lost about a foot of water all summer and gained it back in the fall. Then of course I had to drain it all to have the clay put in. So to recap: would like large perch and bluegill. Help please. Thank you in advance.

The clay lining essentially changed nothing in your pond.

Your description indicates that your pond is still "in communication" with the springs. You may be just fine in years with normal precipitation. However, in a drought year, the water level in your pond is going to go down with the water level of the spring.

P.S. The springs breaking through 12" of well-compacted clay in the bottom of the pond is kind of impressive. How much higher are the surrounding hilltops relative to the elevation of your pond?

P.P.S. Some groundwater flows are based on the precipitation cycle for a single year. Depending on the geology, other flows could be based on water that fell as rain hundreds of years ago. If your pond is in the latter situation, you should not see large fluctuations in the water level. However, your comment that you lost a foot of water last summer is worrisome. Hopefully, you lost that foot during a spell of very dry weather.

Good luck on your pond project and getting some stocking recommendations from the experts!

If you want large BG and YP, you'll need efficient predators to keep numbers down. Largemouth bass probably best candidate, as smallmouth have a hard time keeping up with BG. Also, you might consider feeding.

Luckily a buddy of mine was having a pond dug about 4 miles away so the clay didn’t cost me anything. We had the same builder and he had no where to put it.

The BG are going to make life hard for you. I'm fighting the same battle in my pond. I've trapped out many hundreds BG over the past 12 months, and there is no end in sight.
I have a Z trap soaking 24hrs/day, and it probably wouldn't hurt to build two or three more of them.