Pond Boss Forums MANAGING AN EXISTING POND Evaluating and adjusting fish populations Parmer Pond Winter Work

#1 Along dam looking W to E

#2 On dam looking N

#3 At dam E to W

#4 Another on dam looking up pond

#5 Near head of pond looking to dam
Hope this is proper thread for this post, plan on some major work this winter to get this to a well balanced lake/pond. Has been extremely muddy since Oct floods Atlanta south, about time begins to clear, here comes another 3-7 inches. Took too long to figure out picture posting, in AM will post going to do, maybe will do, and wish list(maybe not this year).Would appreciate any suggestions or ideas on what I plan or better options. Average depth of lake is approx 12 ft, main channel is 16-17 in few areas. East bank is rapid slope to 8-12 ft w/n 12 ft of bank
west bank is almost immediate drop off to 10 ft. Small area @ dam on both end 2-4-6 ft. Front of E dock 6 ft. W dock >10 ft..
Only very minimal area @ head of pond is shallow, channel has almost immediate drop to 6 ft.. Very little structure detectable by depth finder 2-3 dead-fall trees bout all.
Lamar

Hello. Lamar. Looks like you will have a great pond when the experts here get thru with it.
Thing that jumps out at me is with all the pines you have very acid water. Have you had the ph, alkalinity and hardness checked? Has lime been applied recently?
Need to get rid of the mud by applying probably about 1 ton of alum followed by at least as much Calcium hydroxide(quick lime) to neutralize the alum. Will look for the jar test to see how much alum you will need. It shouldnt stay that muddy for more than a week or 2 after a rain.

What a pretty place... Work on the alum treatment and you will have that pond clear and perty! I like the natural shoreline look you have with the trees right up to the edge of the pond. Very nice looking.

Morning All,
first off am going to stick with current management co. and give them a chance to help get it right. When purchased in 3/07 he gave a good analysis of water quality with numbers on both chemistry and type and # of fish to remove. last year was evident unbalanced, lots of 8-12 in LMB no 1 1/2-3# LMB being caught. BG 4-5 in. only few 6-8 in. range and those not fat and sassy. Late summer unbalance evident added threadfins then in Sept electro-shocked in order to check population and remove as many small bass as possible. Approx 260-300 removed by this an fishing in 08. Report for 09 disappointing "water quality good need to remove as many 6-10 in. as possible". Began in early summer reading this forum and began hand feeding BG, appears to made major difference in sizes in 6mo as now can see and catch all size and they are nice and fat.
This pond has 3 springs feeding it plus at least 4 more under water, get a lot of runoff also, so with amount of rain this year a nice bloom was hard to maintain. Basically stays full even when irrigating pastures during drought.
Initial plan is;
1-get rid of muddy water Alum and Qiuck Lime
2- Draw down 4-41/2 feet then seine to check population and remove small LMB.
3- Add habitat while water wadeable 2-3 places near dam(PVC tree),corners near docks(porcupines and similar, place auto feeder BG habitat near shore with 3-4 PVC trees deeper @ point where dead trees are approx 3 o'clock photo 2 & 4. this point has one of more gentle slopes.
Probably Do: Add 12-15 yards of gravel in corners between dam and docks with or w/o rock retainer in semi circle to hold gravel in place a furnish ledge.
Primary other suggestion has been dig 1-2 shallow cul de sacs in upper right for better bedding area, this easily accessible as was originally neighborhood swimming hole.
Thanks
Lamar

Lamar, one more suggestion is to draw it down then do the alum treatment. That will allow you to clear it with much less alum.

good luck

I would use some natural brush for bluegill cover. Cedar or cypress limbs tied together and sunk in 4-6 ft water.

Agree with Burger on structure.

It is my experience that seining bass is a lot easier said than done.

I've never gotten very many in seine hauls, and I don't think any of them were over 5" long.

Agree with you Dave, they like to jump the net.

I believe that Lusk once said that they also flatten themselves on the bottom to let the net go over them.

Pretty place you have there Lamar. Any plans for aeration?

Lamar --

Beautiful looking pond. But, you're right, it sure is brown.

One thing I would want to know is if the muddy water is the result of clay particles already in the pond that get stirred up with water flowing through, or is the muddy water the result of clay that is entering the pond with the runoff? I suspect it is both. If it is from inflow, you'll need to do more than treat the water with alum and quick lime.

I'm not at my home computer, so I don't have access to photographs of some of the things I've done. When we bought our present place about five years ago, our pond would be very muddy after even a small rain. That has been completely fixed. It now only gets muddy when the catfish are spawning and real active.

I spent a lot of time and effort stablizing the inflow. Some with grasses/wetland, some with slowing the water flow and adding settling ponds, and some with diversion.

My first task was to stabilize a barren field that drained about a 15 acre pasture. All the topsoil was gone. It had one erosion ravine that was about 3-foot deep. It fed directly into the pond. With straw bales, rocks, grading, more rocks and more straw bales I flattened the major run-off area from about six feet wide to about 20 feet wide. By widening it, I really slowed the water flow and erosion, and I got grasses to take hold. I diverted the flow into a low area behind the pond that has now become a wetland that stays wet about 10 months out of the year. The water that seeps into the pond from this area is now crystal clear. I did a simlar thing in two other areas that weren't quite as bad. Together, this was probably over 50% of the muddy inflow.

I had another place where water rushed in during storms. It is actually a creek several months out of the year that snakes through the woods. It drops about 100 feet vertically from a wet collection spot to where it finally enters the pond. I put in a culvert right at the entrance to the pond, added a lot of stone, then soil, and finally grass around and over the culvert. Behind the culvert I dug a settling pond that is about 10 foot diameter and two feet deep. The water enters and exits the settling pond through rock walls that trap a lot of leaves and other debris. Each year I clean out the silt and debris that has settled.

About 100 feet upstream from this settling pond, I dug a larger settling pond that is about 25-feet in diameter, and about six feet deep. It was in an area with a lot of erosion due to a steep drop. The spillway is rock lined, and is about 8-feet wide. This cut the erosion considerably. This little pond holds water most of the year, and is home to lots of amphibious critters, and provides water to a lot of furry critters. The water flowing towards the lower settling pond out of this one is now crystal clear. This pond collects a lot of debris.

Another problem area was the road to the pond that drains several acres. Water would flow down the dirt road, pulling lots of clay with it, and dumping it into the pond. Adding ditches on the side, and by adding a diversion ditch that now flows down the back side of the dam, has stopped all of that mud from flowing in.

Lastly, I don't mow down to the pond edge. I leave about a 12-24 inch buffer. I weed whack, and leave the grasses and weeds at least six inches high most of the way around the pond perimeter. This too traps a lot of stuff before it goes in the pond.

Anyway, good luck. It sounds like you've got a good plan. Keep us informed.

Ken

Catmandoo,
Good comments all, muddy/stained water is from in flow primarily from county rd appro 1/2 mi. away through woods that was graded and paved 2 year ago, though silt fence, etc installed still get stained water in heavy rain esp winter as ROW is not fully vegetated as yet, have complained but no solution as yet. Only have 2 small areas minimal staining on my property. My property extends only 80-100 yds above lake and largely inaccessible to large machinery due to steepness of hill on either side. To get a permit to change anything on this creek appears to be nearly non existent, as landowner downstream was cited/shut down 3 years ago for EPA/Wetlands violation when they tried to enlarge lake with new dam, etc w/o all proper studies and permits. So we are already flagged. Prior to the heavy rains and flood of this fall, only saw this occur once each of previous years when we got late winter early spring rain before vegetation had greened up. Appears to be all suspended particle as is almost sediment running in in head of pond. Prior to fall of 09 when did occur only took about 1 week to clear
Lamar

Lamar enjoyed speaking with you yesterday. Seems in addition to our conversatiosn you have other issues at hand as well. Until you can solve the upstream land disturbance it might be costly to perform an alum treatment only to get clay again after big rain??? If you can wait on consult Jan 14 I think we can yield some good advice toward fixing some of the issues your having. Good Luck.

http://i994.photobucket.com/albums/af69/wlparmer/Pond%20Pictures/DSC_0178.jpg?t=1263259055
#6
http://i994.photobucket.com/albums/af69/wlparmer/Pond%20Pictures/DSC_0177.jpg?t=1263258972
#7
http://i994.photobucket.com/albums/af69/wlparmer/Pond%20Pictures/DSC_0181.jpg?t=1263259238
#8
http://i994.photobucket.com/albums/af69/wlparmer/Pond%20Pictures/DSC_0183.jpg?t=1263259303
#9
http://i994.photobucket.com/albums/af69/wlparmer/Pond%20Pictures/DSC_0184.jpg?t=1263259362
#10
http://i994.photobucket.com/albums/af69/wlparmer/Pond%20Pictures/DSC_0185.jpg?t=12632595
#11
The drawdown is done, but now lake is frozen over for last three days, hopefully warm up so can start work later in week. The few BG bed seen in #6 are 10 0f a total 0f 16 I could find around lake. Plan is to add rock and raise bottom in both corners at dam and build ledge 2-4 ft depth 12-15 deep and 25-30 ft long in area shown in #9 and @9 o;clock in #11. Turns out a rock ledge was built basically to turn construction equip(can be seen as drop-off in #11), but this area was approx 1-1 1/2 ft underwater with a silt basin left above. Area above is over knee deep in muck/silt plan to redig that. Greg Grimes is going to come by on Thurs for a consult, looking forward to that.
As you can see have very deep slope on banks with minimal access
so plan is to start providing more BG bedding access, add structure, add feeders maybe aerate. Drawdown was 4 1/2-5 ft.
Any and all suggestions appreciated.
Thanks
Lamar

oops, need to figure out what I did wrong
Lamar

#6

#7

#8

#9

#10

#11
That more better, also #10 is stream flowing into lake
Lamar

Hopefully others will chime in. Look forward to meeting you and hope not totally frozen. You got some potential there with a little machinery work to create some bedding sites.

I agree. Avoid silted areas and steep banks if possible. Look for a couple places in 2-4 ft water that can handle 25 + beds.

Should probably have initially put this in renovation as that appears to be what it has become. Greg came down on 14th and gave me some good info and ideas. Dropped lake another 2 ft on 18th, contractor busy building BG beds, and yesterday added all PVC structure I had made up. At least seeing the entire lake now I have lot better idea of what I'm deally with and where and what structure to add.

This is bedding area added near head of lake, waiting for some drying to move mud, soil and muck excavated to get access to add sand.

Had no idea this little island existed these beds are @approx 6 ft. Wish could add to this but not accessible by tractor. Added 3 PVC porcupines on this.

Rock wall installed ready for sand

Same bed as above with sand installed. this will be largest area and sits in SE corner.

Additional small area could get access to and added small bedding area. Larger area is to left but photo is blurred will retake and post tomorrow. also added 8-9 stumps along dam for structure.

It's shaping up!

Seeing the island and the beds on them, reminds me, they will find a place to spawn.

Looking at the 1st set of pics, the 2nd pic looking along dam back toward the shed and dock, the rounded off corner area past the tall reeds looks like it has some good potential. They will spawn on an incline such as that. It's worth some border rock, sand and gravel.

lamar make sure the bed areas slope back toward the shore. They might be doign that but hard to tell in picture, rocks wil help but gravity on your side is best to protect that investment. That looks more like sand than gravel. See if the guy can ask about river mix that was the term they called the sand mix on the lkae down the road from you.

Yes the island is a good find, a godo place to mark with duck decoy etc and once full use the boat to pull some of the bushes out there for dense cover. Keep up the good work.

Lots of pond work going on last 2 weeks, added 2 large BG beds in corners of dam, added structure. Added 10 large stumps along dam
between primary BG bedding areas. Added 3 additional bedding areas along bank where could get trac-hoe access. Added lots of natural structure(trees) to reinforce 2 old dead-fall trees, Stumps in front of 2 small cul-de-sacs where springs flow in. Added one area of dense cover with platform for feeder, hopefully to serve as nursery also. Built and or added artificial structure around docks where I do a lot of ultra lite fishing and where kids fish with light tackle or bream buster.
Learned a lot about my lake by drawdown , most I suspected a few surprises. Banks on shallow side of lake (8-10 ft) was steeper than I imagined, Almost vertical drop for approx 20-30 yards. Better idea of inflow, realize in wet winter but getting 3-4" rise/day from springs and inflow. One in of rain gives me approx 6-8 rise in runoff in this wet winter. drew down 6 fton 1/13 and I'm about 18 inches from full pool, predcting 1-2 inches tonight and tomorrow so it's muddy but will be nearly full.
Posting. picture with short explanation.

Along dam with stumps added, and bedding area each corner.

Feeding platform for TH feeder with structure added for nursery for fry and small BG, adding 3 PVC structures about 30 ft aout from this structure.

Two small bedding areas added adjacent to cover and feeding platform above.

Non snag structure along steep bank near primary dock, appears to be favorite hangout for small bass beecause of fry and small BG hanging out @ base of bullrush.

Two trees @ 6 ft to go near secondary dock (12 ft water) to partially replace small junk trees pulled out that had nothing but few stems left, and caused a lot of frustration with kids fishing.

12 of these around docks 3-4 ft for the 6-8 ft water and 4-5 ft for 10-12 ft water.

These are to go approx 20 ft or so out from the feeding platform and cover/structure in one of the above pics water 8-10ft. BTW
can't take credit for these not my creation, did not know if credit to the creator was allowed if so will give credit later.

Will also be adding another TH feeder near head of lake(land legs) where reinforced old structure near 6 X 20 foot bedding area. Intend to continue to feed @ docks and along dam 2X day.
Also added 15-4 ft PVC porcupines around lake sandbar, necks,
around edge where adding natural not feasible.

Some happy fish right there! Great work...

Thanks for update. I like to put more cover in a concentrated area. Try on next addition to add 2-3 of your creations in a tight bunch and not spaced out, if possible push 2-3 stumps in a bunch instead of spaced as well, my 2 cents. Yes lamar was first in the country our new "poor man habitats".