Pond Boss Forums AQUATIC VEGETATION Balance of plants in the environment new pond, what to plant?

i'm a new member, and love this web site! thanks. i built about a 7 acre lake, shaped kind a like a swimming pool. about 23 feet full depth near the dam, then steps up and up. has texture on the bottom, clay "benches" for cover; channels, boulders, tree stumps, cedar trees, etc. some steep sides and drop offs. it's overview shape kinda looks like a pear, a long pear! the dam is 850 feet long, and really big! the dam was closed in early september 2002, and i already have 18-19 feet of water in the deep end. the shallow spawning areas are not covered with water yet. i'm located in northern arkansas. i'm wondering what i should start to plant; cattail? lilly pads; etc...?? i went scuba diving in it last week to map out structure and anchor items. i just fertilized the pond so it probably won't be clear for much longer. it is stocked with bass, bluegill and cats (thanks to our game and fish commission!)and 50 pounds of fathead minnows. anyway, i have really enjoyed this project, and hope to establish some good vegetation, just need to know what, when to plant, how to, and where to purchase. i know trees and brush are not good for dams, but what about certain plants?thanks.

hmmm, planting 7 acres, a few do's and dont's there, for sure.
Its useful to know your priority is fish, that indicates you can use plants that provide shade, shelter for fish and fry that improve water quality and add to diversity for them during their different phases.

Large water lilies are an obvious choice, take care to pick varieties with good flowering and growing habits, planted two to three feet deep they will create good cover from strong sun and shelter fish fry that rely on shallow waters... You might as well have good flowers on them, some varieties don't

Large marginal plants (they root in water putting foliage above the water level)
you might like to try: hardy canna, larger aquatic iris, pickerel weed, papyrus, cyperus, arundinaria, phragmites, sweet flag....

Ponside plants (bog plants which like damp, but not saturated soil)
You might choose these more for their 'ornamental' features, to create attractive reflections, mask ugly features, as a privacy screen etc: miscanthus, petasites, royal fern, ostrich feather fern, filipendula, arum lilies, bupthalmum

Some don'ts, if its a new pond, plant anything which could seriously overwhelm plantings, some invasives have growing habits which can outpace anything you can do to control it, lol... duckweed, azolla, large native cat tails, water hyacinth will in their way create problems which can be unmanageable...

The plants mentioned are 'safe bets' to form a start on such a large scale, you may well find your average nursery a bit daunting on prices, aquatic plants are a bit specialised and the growers season is rather short, dont expect the 'good stuff' to be available so easy on the cheap.... try to resist the 'deals' you can get on the likes of 'cat tails' as they are a vicious invasive which smother and destroy many a great location...
That sort of 'cheap deal' wont be so cheap to clear ten years down the line as the entire pond is swamped and infilled by them....

Many of these plants turn up on e-bay at better than retail prices, you could ship in batches of them from growers and 'phase' them in a few dozen at a time, aquatics have quite rapid growth rates and will surprise you how quickly they form beneficial clumps of foliage, take care to pick varieties which have the redeeming feature of being easy to divide, to move on to create new positions, or mulch, lol

Regards, Andy

wow...this website is great! thanks a lot for your help. a couple of other questions, what website or online nursery would you recommend to purchase these plants? also, excuse my ignorance, but some of these plants to i have to shove them into the dirt under the water? how deep? and i've got some areas that are still not covered with water yet, these are the future shallow areas of 1-4 feet deep. does the area need to be covered with water, or can i plant these on dry ground etc?...told you i was clueless about what to plant!!! if i just knew where to purchase, i could get started. what about lilly pads? my lake sides are pretty steep in the deep ends...i tell you what, i'm gonna email you a few pics, and see what you think. i really appreciate your time. mark ilovefishingmark@yahoo.com

Something apparent in your photos made me wonder, does your lake have a stable overflow...

If your water level is going to fluctuate widely through the year that can present a severe limitation on what plants can thrive.

When you can determine your water level fluctuation you can then think about planting stuff that stands some chance of reliably thriving and getting diversity of habitat working for your priorities, not against you.

A fundamental principle of aquatic planting is grasping

1) The deep water aquatic zone (reliably submersed in fertile water with adaquate light) -say 1' to 4' deep (any deeper and not much grows or is accesible

2) The marginal zone (soil constantly saturated with water) -at water level to about two foot deep

3) The bog zone (soil constantly wet, but not saturated) -from water level and above

Additionally you need to take several ph readings through the day from any obvious influences, to determine the basic water type, that can seriously affect what grows, check to see if you have extremes like acid water coming off pine woods, is your normal water high or low ph.

A few litmus test strip kits cost a couple of bucks from sciplus.com can figure out a ph profile for the seven acres, taking readings early and late in the day should indicate what 'type' of water you have

When those zones are reliably identified, then you can plant stuff that will thrive in those positions

As for sources, I can only refer to the one good contact in the one large scale aquatic plant wholesaler who gets me stuff at trade prices, otherwise I'm at the mercy of the retail trade, just like you. If you form a viable wishlist I can put out feelers there.

Ebay is good for picking up dribs and drabs to 'make a start' ....generally to pick up plants to start colonising a water garden it's fairly hard to beat that.... Probably way to go for you to put a range of plants in to 'test' your positions when the water margins are stabilised, before placing bulk orders anywhere.... it might take a month to 'test' a range of plants and measure if they will 'take' ....that will reduce serious losses if your water level, soil or water ph is variable

Being active on message boards usually means I get to know real good collectors and can get more stuff than I can use, so the notion of 'buying' plants from retailers is virtually irrelevant to me.

With having several acres here, planting them with aquatics, I'm more interested in what grows well here that fetch a good price in the long run, so I'm into making ponds, and planting them



I find cutting grass boring lol

Regards, Andy

thanks. as far as overflow, i'm still needing about 5 more feet of water to reach the spillway. i imagine during the summer it will fluctuate some. eventually, i'm probably going to have a well dug with a 10 gal/min pump , and keep it topped off, and have a little control over the water level. i was told to give a couple of years and see what happens first. i still can't believe i already got 18-19 feet of water in it since september from just run off.

well, you folks know your stuff, and i really apppreciate your help. which book do you recommend i get...i've seen a few mentioned on this web site. thanks, mark

Andrew, I am very impressed with your knowledge on the emergent aquatics, and will probably have some questions for your eventually, but I urge you to be cautious with the talk about using non-natives. Here in Wisconsin, our native stocks of plants are threatened by eurasian water milfoil, curly leaf pondweed,phragmities, purple loosestrife, and canary reed grass. I can guess that the guys in the south can name a few other introduced species that they deal with. Again, thank you for the informative posts.
Robert B

yup, I'd always double check what plants have invasive habits locally before planting any pond that was likely to connect with other ecologies, phragmites has quite a good reputation for improving water quality and might be useful where its in a position where it can be confined.

Theres quite a lot of lakes out there which are dead as ponds go, after decades of barren neglect of aquatic species, introducing species which are known to be beneficial for example irises (extracting poisonous metals) and hardy waterlilies (providing shade and shelter for fish) are at least some effort to improve habitats which could be otherwise useless.

Somethings going to colonise them, it might as well be something that you can measure as having some redeeming features, While a 'birder' might be obsessive about one thing, a fishing afficienado swear by another thing, a bandwagon eco nut with an eye on political ratings may be whipping the usual headline species...

As a long term ponding nut I'm going to stick my oar in the water as being almost neutral on 'what works' to improve aquatic habitats



Regards, Andy

what are those plants shown on the "photo" page. it's the pic with a cabin on a pond with some flowering plants. iris? i don't know plants, sorry! are they good to use in the south (northern arkansas). mark