Pond Boss Forums POND CONSTRUCTION Creating habitat Help me plan (daydream)

I'm in the process of figuring out exactly what I want out of my pond before I begin construction. i.e., I'm daydreaming.

I thought I'd use this thread to sort of think out loud about what I'd like to do. Please excuse the lack of organization. I'm just kind of rambling on with whatever ideas pop into my head as I narrow down exactly what I want to do. I'd love it if all of you would jump in with any comments, ideas, or advice. I'm just in the planning stages now, so any ideas are welcome!

The pond will be on the same 25 acres of a mostly cleared meadow that our house sits on. I'm shooting for a 3-5 acre pond, depending on what the land layout and watershed dictate.

My main goal for the pond is fishing for both food and fun for both adults and kids. I'd like to grow some good sized BG and LMB, possibly some CC as well if they won't adversely affect my other goals for the pond. I'd like to be able to take young impatient kids out there and have them catching at least some small fish pretty quickly and easily. I'd also like some big ones to provide fun for adults.

I'd like enough fish in there that I can catch dinner for our family of four 1 or 2 times a week, and do the occasional large fish fry for a big group of friends and family without worrying about depleting the fish population.

I'd like the fish population to be as self-sustaining as possible so that if a zombie apocalypse ever closes down Wal-mart I can use the pond to feed my family.

A secondary goal is swimming. I'd like to keep the water as clear and clean as possible, and free from scum and too much vegetation. I'd love to have good swimming areas for both kids and adults. For the kids I'd like to have a "beach" area with gravel that gradually slopes into the water so that kids of various ages can wade at various depths without walking through mud. I'd like to somehow keep this shallow wading area free of algae and other plants. I'd also use this gravel wade-in area to launch kayaks and paddle boats.

For adult swimming I'd like to have a good sized area that's deep enough for jumping in and for large groups to float around and swim, and possibly for big inflatable swim toys like water platforms, trampolines, and slides. I really liked the natural rock steps and diving boards from the "Family Farm" thread and would love to build features like this into the pond. As a matter of fact, I think I'd be perfectly happy duplicating that exact pond, minus the house! Here are some pictures from that thread of some of the features I'd like to have:

Gravel wading beach: http://i243.photobucket.com/albums/ff73/skrehbiel/farm/4Picture036.jpg

Rock jumping platform: http://i243.photobucket.com/albums/ff73/skrehbiel/farm/5Picture083.jpg

Island with rock steps leading up and rock jumping board sticking out: http://i243.photobucket.com/albums/ff73/skrehbiel/farm/5Island.jpg

Awesome work on that project Scott. It's a real inspiration!

I'd also like to build a nice sized dock for sitting and for fishing. I'm thinking of having half of it covered for shade, and half uncovered for fishing and sunning. I'm picturing things like a porch swing, table and chairs, maybe a chiminea on the dock.

Now, some potential problems that I've already come up with:

The combined use for swimming and fishing. For optimal fishing, I need lots of structure in the pond at various depths. For safe swimming, I need areas clear of structure. It would also probably be good to keep the inevitable lost lures, hooks and lines away from places where people will be swimming.

The solution I can see is to designate certain areas for fishing and others for swimming. As for the dock, I'd love to be able to both fish and swim from it. I'm wondering if two separate docks would be the solution -- a Swimming/Relaxing dock and a fishing dock. A separate fishing dock would also allow me to build in a fish cleaning station, which my wife wouldn't tolerate next to her porch swing on the Relaxing dock!

Another solution might be to do two smaller separate ponds, one for swimming and one for fishing. I'm not as keen on this idea though because I like the idea of looking out my window to see one big continuous body of water.

Now that I've rambled on for a while, feel free to ramble on with your own thoughts or advice!

Ack:

Don't completely discount having two separate ponds. You could use them for two opposed fish stocking schemes, optimizing the swimming pond for an absence of nibbles (several fish species have been objected to here by skinny dippers). In addition to leaving structure out of the swimming pond, you might also choose to have very different dirt features in it (shallow slopes at the edges for safety, as opposed to steeper slopes in the non-swimming pond for weed control.

I'd see how the topography of the site played for 1 vs 2 ponds wrt budget before making a final decision. If two would be a lot cheaper than 1 ...

Thanks Theo. Now you've got me thinking... Maybe two ponds close together with a covered deck area on the strip of land in the middle. There could be docks extending from this covered deck area out into both ponds. One dock optimized for fishing and one for swimming and lounging.

More ideas please!

I'll be watching this thread closely as the goals for your pond mirror those of mine, although on a much smaller scale.

I also want small kids to be able to hook small fish on a routine basis, but want adults to be able to target large specimens and I too want to able to swim in my pond. Mine will be about 2/3 of an acre and no one has told me I can't have both.

http://www.pondboss.com/forums/ubbthreads.php?ubb=showflat&Number=140878

One thing, from reading your blurb, I gathered you want to harvest once or twice per week from your pond and have the occasional fish fry. I don't know if this will be possible due to the size of your pond. I would imagine it could potentially have some adverse and possibly challenging effects on the fish population. But I'm no expert, just throwing that out there for a pond guru to field...

I'm with Theo on the idea of two separate ponds. Swimming and fishing are diametrically opposed as to how to achieve them in ponds; to get your water clear for swimming, while also keeping out weedgrowth, you're probably going to have to use a dye product that shades out sunlight; but said dyes also kill plankton, which is the foundation of the food chain in any pond, so your fish will be severely handicapped in both their growth rates and the overall numbers the pond will support.

On the other hand, if you had two separate ponds, you could dye the upstream one, and fertilize the downstream one. Fertilizing keeps out weedgrowth, but does it in a very different way from the dyes in that it boosts plankton growth so you get a plankton bloom which not only blocks out the sunlight but turbo-charges your entire food chain so every fish in the pond grows drastically faster and the pond will carry three to ten times as many total pounds of fish. And, you could easily harvest on a very regular basis from a fertilized pond; a dyed one would quickly be depleted of fish by anything approaching the level of harvest you're wanting to implement.

Walt:

Other than swimming in green water with a visibility of 18" or so, why not use the plankton bloom to keep the weeds at bay in the swimming pond? I gotta be missing something.

I don't mind doing that, but I understand not everyone might feel that way. Much better visibility is likely a better idea for safety purposes when swimming.

I never cared for swimming in a pond personally, so I'm not the right person to ask on that subject, but generally from what I've read, those that do enjoy it prefer the clear water; I was just assuming that would be the case here, but that doesn't necessarily mean it is - you know what they say about assuming.

But another point that Ack made himself is that a pond for fishing should have a good amount of cover in it, and cover obviously is not a good thing to have a lot of in the water if people are going to be swimming in it. I'm sure it's very doable to have one pond for both, but it might be simpler and more efficient to have two.

But I would also imagine you can keep a small section (don't need much area reserved for swimming) free of structure and vegetation. The rest of the pond can be reserved exclusively for fishing.

You can basically eliminate one small area of your pond where you don't need to throw your line.

Keeping in mind i just had a thread about structure only being 20% of the pond, I would think it fairly easy to make it so that the structure is in a different 20% then the swimming area. Also, would some kind of weed preventing underlayment be good for controlling aquatic growth in the swimming area? We had a sand box when i was very young and it had a black underlayment to keep weeds from growing up. Keeping it clear, that I don't have any good ideas on.

Just noob thoughts.

We have a 1 acre pond for fishing and swimming. It was the best investment we ever made. We have a fixed dock with a ramp that leads to a 12' square floating dock. It is the center of social gstherings and the kids (13 and 15) love it for swimming. Fishing and swimming are completely compatable, at least in central Indiana. Last weekend was a blast with kids from 11 to 46 having fun swimming. My father-in-law, who we recently lost, swam in our pond into his 80's. I hope I do as well.

Great testimonial RAH. I too hope I'm able to swim well into my 80s. We have an older couple down our street (not meaning to hijack here...), probably in their 70s, who routinely come outside and play basketball together.

Is this a great place or not?

Ack
Your dreaming closely resembles a path we beat over the last 4 years

I vote for 1 big pond. 2 docks if you are real worried about it and think the 2 activities should be separated.

My pond is 2 acres with 1 dock and have found that swimmers don't venture very far from the dock. I placed all of the structure away from the dock so they wouldn't get in the way of the swimmers and, as you said, so hooks/lures are less likely to get lost near the swimming area.

We swim in our pond all the time, I can't imagine not swimming in it. We keep one section of shoreline clear of plants to allow for easier access. We don't have a sandy beach so I throw down a section (about 6' x 8') of outdoor carpeting half way in and out of the water. Keeps our feet from getting muddy. Number 37 on our to do list is build a floating dock.

I vote for the two ponds versus one pond, but both with fish in them!. At the Lusk Lodge 2, I saw how much fun it could be to have two entirely different fishing experiences on one property. To each his own though.

We get nipped at on occasion by fish, at our pond is is usually by YOY LMB and occasionally by smaller BG. It kinda startles you but it's not like they are going to drag you under.

Wow! Thanks for all of the great info and ideas everyone. Keep them coming!

Otto, I hope you're taking notes on all this because I just spoke with Sherri a few days ago about getting you out here to plan this thing out for me once I settle on exactly what I want to do.

Brettski, thanks for the link to your mega-thread. Following what you've done and all of the questions you had along the way will be really helpful. You've already saved me from starting a couple of new threads since you've already had the same questions answered!

Otto,I dont think you put enough emphisis on the GREAT part.

I'm all for the 2 pond idea. The top one would collect most of the runoff/nutrients, so make that the fishing pond and use the downstream one as the swimming pond.

Having two separate fisheries that close to each other is a lot of fun. When you get tired of one or the fish aren't biting you can switch to the other. With two ponds in series like that keep in mind whatever fish are in the upstream pond will likely make it into the other.

It's been pouring rain all day today. There's tons of water running all over my land. It's making me really wish that my pond was already dug and collecting all of this rain!

Everyone talking about water clarity vs. fertilizing for a fishing pond has gotten me thinking. How possible is it to have one clear and clean looking pond and still have good fishing in it? If we go the one-pond route then I'm not willing to compromise much on the fishing quality, but my wife probably won't swim in the pond if the water doesn't look fairly "clean."

I would say yes.

Really clean would mean that not as many fish would be supported by the natural food chain (plankton on up), but you could still feed to have a decent total biomass of fish. In that situation, you would want to utilize species that provide lots of fishing from pelleted feed consumption (HSB come to mind).

When one considers what it would take to control and change the water clarity of a 3 - 5 ac pond....or even a 1 - 2 ac pond, the input required can easily be OTT overwhelming. Sure, you can make some minor adjustments, but changing the actual clarity in a BOW that big, with a soil/clay bottom just ain't something the average Pondmeister can afftect to any substantial degree.
Let's face it; in the end, it is what it is. Mother Nature does what she pleases.

Hey Ack,

You could have a clear and productive pond with about 20-30% aquatic vegetation coverage. But there are several caveats. First, there must be a way to cycle the primary production from the vegetation rapidly into the food chain. In the typical farm pond, most of the primary production is located in the phytoplankton. And the phytoplankton cycles rapidly into the zooplankton, on up to the top predators, and back to the substrate and water column. Few species actually eat submerged aquatic vegetation (SAV) in freshwater, which can lead to an overabundance of slow-cycling primary production. Our 1-acre pond was designed with 25% of the bottom in water less than 3' deep. The borders of the "shelf" area are lined with concrete rock beds for the SAV predators - crayfish in this case. As the SAV (water celery and widgeon grass) grows out to 3 feet (which it currently is), the crayfish should (in theory) eat the vegetation from the relative safety of the rock beds. The crayfish are then consumed by the bass to get the primary production of the SAV quickly into the fish production line. We'll see if this actually works. ~lol~ Of course, this is all experimental. You might want to stick with more traditional options.

The other problem is restricting the vegetation from your swimming areas. The gravel beach sounds like a good way to keep the vegetation out. Most SAV species don't grow very well on gravel. Our pond has a platform near the edge of the shelf for access to the deeper water (6'). There's a sandy beach, but it's been overwhelmed with water celery and spawning bluegills and redears.

I still daydream about the pond. My next project will be stocking some chain pickerels now that the SAV beds have established themselves. These guys should be more active in the cold months, providing even more control of the small sunfish population.

That's my 2-cents.

I would highly reccomend the multiple pond concept. I started out with one pond approximately 1.5 acers and last year I had it divided into 2. I have the 2 pond concept for the simple reason of redundancy and experimentation. Whith two ponds, I can experiment or try new things with one pond and leave the other alone. If I have a failure with the experimental pond, like a fish kill, no worries I have the other pond to enjoy some fishing and harvesting while I "rebuild" the experimental pond. Also, when a fish kill happens, you can restock from one pond to the next for free. This year I may split the bigger pond again. So I would have 3 ponds instead of 2. Forage fish raising or sesonal growout pond. On the down side, there are some more capital costs with multiple ponds like feeders, docks, lights, aerators. Just my 2 cents