Pond Boss Forums INTRO Questions & Observations Winter Kill Question

I have a 2 acre pond, 25% of the pond is roughly 15+ the rest is around 6ft. The pond has some pretty heavy vegetation in it. It has juvenile LMB and YP in it. I live in montana and we had a fairly long winter. The pond wasnt frozen solid all winter though it would thaw and refreeze. A couple of times it had snow cover over the ice but it was only for maybe a week at a time before it melted. I have no aeration. From what I have read its a recipe for winterkill. I went to the pond about a week ago and saw no signs of dead fish at all. Casting from shore for about an hour I didnt get any bites. It was also a nice calm evening coming of a fairly warm day and I saw no surface activity. Also note the water temp was pretty cold. We were having 36 degree nights and 65 degree days for about a week. That is coming of of even colder weather prior. So maybe the fish wernt active yet. I am worried i may have experienced winter kill. I am wondering what it the best way to find out for sure. Thanks

Walking the edges looking for fish life is a good start. Fishing with a small worm and small hook is the next best bet. Any idea what current water temps are?

I dont really know what the water temps are yet, with mid 30's at night and mid 60's in day I cant think the temp is much higher the 45 degrees. I walked the edges and saw nothing. But I never have seen anything from the bank. Also the water is pretty murky from the spring runoff. There are lots of turtle in the pond I dont know if that means anything.

I have a feeling that you are O.K. (no winterkill) The freeze thaw cycles helped you. It's when the ponds are covered with ice for many months, and then snow on top of that which cuts off any light transmission thru the ice is when you have problems.

My winter fish kill for the first time in 16 years was as esshup said, the pond froze up and had snow cover all winter. When the ice thawed most of my dead fish floated to the top, but a few fell to the bottom and still have flesh on them. I have no idea why. I can see tadpoles feasting on the ones I can see clearly. My guess is your fish are OK.

Red, you may just be ok. Yes, I'll sure bet that your fish are still cool, not very active, and deep. The ponds always warm a little slower than the surround land. Just look at how excited anglers get on the first warm day, but those cold-blooded fish think it is still only one day past winter.

Thanks guys, this is helping calm my fears. This pond has had trout in it about 10 years ago and either had a complete summer kill or winter kill, I havnt decided if the water got too hot or they winter killed. But I know that LMB and YP are hardier when in comes to required oxygen. And I have a suspicion the trout died from the water becoming to hot. Probably during august when we usually get 2-3 weeks of 100+ weather. Thanks for the opinions, Ill give the pond a couple more weeks of some warm weather and head back out there with the boat so I can get a temp reading.

Red -- give us a few more details. Where are you in the state? With 100+ air temperature, I'd guess you are out on the eastern plains? What is the elevation? Then, give us an update in a couple of weeks. The fish will "surely" have to be biting by then, eh?

Dave, South eastern portion of the state, about 90 miles north west of Belle Fourche sd. Elevation is about 3400 i believe. I sure hope they will be biting in a couple weeks.

I sure hope you made the winter! That LMB - YEP combination has been a good one for us. We consistently produce the nice 10-12 inch perch with largemouth bass as the predator. I hope all is well in your pond. As you mentioned in your original description, at least your snow tends to melt between storms. The same is true for western SD. However, in eastern SD, we tend to have the snow stay for quite a while. We don't get the warm spells in between.

You are located in gorgeous country! I am jealous!

Well, I went out yesterday with the boat and the good news is the pond didnt winter kill. Water Temp was around 56 degrees, caught seven LMB. All of them were around 9inches, seems like they are taking forever to grow, but I guess the last time I saw them was last fall, I dont imagine the grow a lot in the winter. I am just happy there still here. Although, I havnt caught a YP in awhile though.

Red -- that sounds great!! The LMB are much more susceptible to low winter D.O. than are perch. Perch are pretty darn tough and the bass usually would die before the perch. Anyway, if you had perch last fall, I'll bet they are still there. They should have spawned already. Did you see any egg masses? Long gelatinous sheath that is a pale yellow.

Yes, your LMB growth is slow. It just takes a while for those Montana LMB to get large. Your growing season is on the short end of their entire range.

I havent seen any perch egg masses, but I havnt really looked too hard. The area where I assume they would spawn is really marshy still.

Dave, in your experience what kind of forage fish works best in our area for making Big LMB. I have access to fathead minnows and will be trying to establish them this spring. The pond has couple of good fingers that are shallow that i think I can get them established. I realize as the bass grow they will hammer the population and maybe they are too big now but I am going to try it anyway. I think I still have YP in the pond but last summer I was culling them out because I was afraid they would take the pond over. To be honest with you I still havnt figured out how the perch got in the pond. The pond is in the middle of nowhere and very private. I guess I could have inadvertently done it. I find it odd that last fall and this spring I havnt caught any YP. Maybe culling them was a mistake. I would just take out any YP I caught maybe 50 at the most. according to some experts here in montana, BG are a bad choice because they do much better in cool water and tend to overpopulate and stunt. I have seen that in other local ponds with YP also that why i culled last summer. Do you know of any resources in western SD for GSM or other forage.

Red, you are in a tough position. I know people in Montana are concerned about the bluegills (and yellow perch) overpopulating. I think there is some truth to that, but it may go back to initial stocking policies. When you stock 2 inch, age 0, LMB and BLG fingerlings in a Montana pond at the same time, then you can expect the bluegills to spawn the next year at age 1, while the LMB definitely will not spawn until they reach at least age 2. So, the bluegills overpopulate because they are spawning before the LMB, and there aren't enough predators to control the panfish.

However, you seem to have the LMB adults established. In that case, we do not see the bluegill (or yellow perch) overpopulating here in SD. The LMB tend to crowd at small sizes (often only 20% of our electrofishing sample for LMB will be 12 inches or longer; the rest will be smaller). As a result, they effectively prey on the small BLG and YEP, so panfish densities are low and the panfish grow fast and reach large sizes. As I said, you can expect to produce 10-12 inch YEP in your pond. My guess is that you could also produce 8-9 inch BLG as well.

Now, the problem is that you probably want to be conservative. At least, I tend to be conservative in northern ponds. So, you really are safest to leave the LMB crowded to keep panfish in check.

You asked how to grow larger LMB. The only way I know is to thin the LMB by angling. You need to harvest those less than say 12 inches, and release only the bigger ones. I would NOT want both YEP and BLG in my Montana pond if I was harvesting the small bass. I think you could grow at least a 4 pound LMB under this strategy. We see 6 pounders as the top end in the western SD ponds.

Fathead minnows are just too darn vulnerable to LMB predation and disappear in a year or two in a new pond. If your biggest LMB are 9 inches now, maybe you could stock a couple of gallons of fatheads and get one spawn from them. However, they just will not persist. Do you have any friends or neighbors out there with golden shiners in their ponds? If so, move some adult (8 inch) shiners into your pond. If you have some aquatic vegetation, the shiners may persist in your pond and help with prey supply. Remember that larger bass also will eat smaller bass.

So, I hope this helps. Classic advice for Montana ponds has been to manage for larger LMB in ponds without panfish. If you want to manage for bigger panfish, then keep the LMB crowded (small).

Here is my email address: david.willis@sdstate.edu

Contact me by email and I'll email you a couple of papers we did on bluegill and yellow perch with largmeouth bass in a series of SD ponds. I know your growing season is even shorter than ours, but this is about as close to you as you will find some good pond studies. Most of our ponds were in central SD around the Pierre area.

I emailed you dave we can continue there.