Pond Boss Forums STOCKING A NEW POND Creating the food chain Strip Pits

Has anyone heard of adding fertile topsoil to strip pits to get some plant growth? Would this cloud the water, it should settle out eventually I would think.
Robert

I would think if you wanted plant life in a strip pit that you could possibly add top soil but before I would go to all that trouble I would just add structure to it and then not worry about adding plants it is hard to keep a strip pit in a managed state with out trying to complicate things DOC

Hi Robert! My strip pit and all the others around me are loaded w/ coontail and curly leaf pond weed. I don't know where it came from since the lake are over 45 years old. It seams that coon tail is quite common in pits. Have never heard of putting topsoil in a lake, my first thought is that it would be too loose and would get kicked up alot on windy days? Just a thought.

Brad Bortz:

How big is your pit? Is it an old gravel pit? What is your avg. depth? How clear is your water? Do you fertilize or are you happy with your carrying capacity per acre and what would you guessimate it to be? What type of fish have you stocked or are present in the biomass? If LMB and bluegill, how has your growth been over the years.

Thanks for your info., I have a 16 ac. gravel pit nearing completion after 12 years. My lake has mostly common pondweed (A.20% coverage)with no cattails, coontail or any other type of plants other than willow growing all along the shore line in many places.

Rowly

Rowly, My pit is an old coal pit as are the others arond me. It's 5 acres and I just bought it in Jan. 2003. It has an avg. depth of 15 ft. and has been ultra clear until the weather got warm and I have just noticed a bloom in the last 3 weeks, visibility is now less than 3 feet according to my white spinnerbait! I could easily see the bottom when we first bought it in jan. 15 ft. plus. as far as carrying capacity I really don't know what you mean by that. I have coontail in over 80% of the water and the curly leaf is in the 2 shallow (small) coves. It was a pay lake for many years and the owner told me there was bass bluegill crappie catfish and carp in it. Have yet to see a cat but have seen all the others. To date the bass have been small but healthy. the bluegill are large but not many have been caught. The crappie are all 9"or better so there's a hell of a fish fry coming up!!!! I stocked 300 5" bluegill 3 weeks ago but don't know how they are doing as I've only seen a few since then. I've been trying to feed them but they're not responding yet, the carp found the feed though. I'm trying to remove a few carp, all the crappie and the large cats if there are any. I'm after a HOG BASS tank, Thats my goal. Oh, what did you mean about carrying capacity?

Brad, carrying capacity is the amount of fish your body of water can hold. Variables to this is the fertility of the water. The clearer the water the less fertile it is. With more nutrients, more plankton and zooplankton, etc. the more carrying capacity your water has and the less clear it is. In the south, they tend to fertilize their waters to increase their carrying capacity to approx. 400 lbs per acre of total fish weight. An unfertilized body of water holds up to 100 lbs per acre. Most northern ponds don't fertilize. My water is clear but the algae bloom and plankton bloom helps to reduce the clarity somewhat during the growing season. I guessimate my carrying capcaity at 200 lbs of total fish per acre. With that number, I will add the appropriate number of adult LMB soon to my biomass, remembering I need the adequate amount of forage base and size to support those bass growing (1 lb bass to 10 lbs forage fish). Remembering that LMB eat 3.0 to 3.5 times smaller fish than themselves. Does this help and isn't pond/fish management great.....????

Rowly

Thanks Rowly! My best guess on carrying capacity in my lake would be 100-150 lbs per acre. This is based on water clarity of 3-5 ft right now, The amount of fish I have been catching and the size of the fish. Water temps are about 60 right now and the bloom is not quite in full swing (I hope) I would really like to fertize but since I just purchased this place, I don't know If I need to.I may wait till next year, after I have more time to see how this lake acts, so to speak. I don't want to do something I don't need to do and screw things up. Thanks for the reply! Good luck.

Brad, best of luck...don't forget that once you start to fertilize then your must continue to fertilize with your program as suggested by the books, etc.

Rowly

Brad:

Have you ever considered using domestic ducks and geese to help your natural fertilizing program for your northern pond with very clear water at approx. 4 per acre to start with?????

Rowly

Yeah Rowly, we had about 10 ducks, but they slowly dissapeared. coyotes and foxes my guess. Did'nt have a floating dock for them to rooste on so they're gone. But no big deal cause this past year we had an awsome bloom and the coontail is almost extinct. Don't know what happened either cause we did not fertilize. Just our normal feeding schedule. Man those b-g and cats sure got fat over the summer. I just decided to let mother nature work her magic for the first couple of years and so far so good. How's your pit lookin?

Brad;

The pit is going well, I rehabbed the east shoreline and the northern most island shoreline with riprap rock....some 100 tonnes plus and created a buffer zone up from the waters edge some 10-20' planted with ornamental grasses, shrubs, periennials and native trees, mostly spruce, red maples and white birch trees for contrast, in 2004. This year, I plan on finishing the back part of the east shoreline, building an 900 sq ft. addition full of glass out towards the lake onto the house. In the future, I will regrade the southern exposured backyard after the addition and use one 8-10,000 gal pump to pump the lake water up to a waterfall, 2-3 ornamental ponds and some 300' of streambeds and near the addition before the water cycles back into the lake in a "U" shaped pattern. Therefore, I'm hoping I won't need any bio-filters etc, as the water will continuously be recycled from the natural lake water and environment which already has clear pit water.

The lake, is growing very nicely and the domestic ducks and geese seem to be a real benefit, if not for natural fertilization but definitely in controlling weed growth around our shallow gravel pit. How is your lake plans/project coming...? I think we all have come a long ways with the great help from this forum and its knowledgeable contributors. Thanks All

Rowly

PS. Brad...have you ever considered "cage culture" for any species of your fish for grow-out etc. I really would love to try a few Hybrid Stripped Bass in this environment to help grow by hand feedings, experiment and enjoy, when I have spare time...HA!HA!