Starting a thread for my new project. We are in the process of moving into a house on 7.5 acres with an existing pond which is a little over 1/10th of an acre and was dug 20 or so years ago to a depth of 14 feet. There are also 2 "creeks" on the property that run on the east and west sides of the pond. Previous homeowner says they have caught LMB, BG, NP, BCP, and some other species they can't identify.
Plan is to totally start over by pumping out the existing pond and expanding it to the NE into the currently unused area between the two creeks. The eastern creek is a tile drainage that starts about 200 yards to the south, so I may see if I am allowed to incorporate that into the pond to give a little more space and potentially a flowing water area that stream minnows could successfully spawn in. Either way, the pond will be 1/2 acre or slightly larger when finished. Planned species are SMB, RES, YP, and forage minnows (FHM and GSH for sure).
The area planned for expansion is currently overrun with willows, so my initial project will be to clear that area out. That will probably be about as far as I will get this year with the other projects I'm planning for the rest of the property, but I may get the expansion done later this summer/fall.
Any pics from the ground right now would just be a white blanket I'll get some up of the area as soon as we thaw out a bit. EDIT: Found a picture of the backyard from when they listed the property. Not a great picture, but you can see the little watering hole and all of the willows back behind. You can also see the pile of broken concrete they left for me which will be put to good use at some point.
Well, first "setback" with the project. I've been working on clearing out the brush along both creeks to make room for some more desirable plantings with wildflowers, native grasses, and fruit/nut trees and bushes. While I was working on that, the wife decided She doesn't want the willows gone because she will lose all of the privacy around the pond. So I'm planting rows of wild plum and other large shrubs around the whole thing but on the opposite site of the creeks. Critters will love it when done I guess.
Attached photo is a closer aerial showing existing and approximate proposed pond (blue).
Anyone have experience with a skid loader front mounted brush hog? Been thinking of renting one to try out on the willows, but some of them are nearing 3" diameter so I didn't know if it could handle those. Any advice is sure welcome!
I would not run my 5 foot tractor mounted brush hog through 3" diameter trees even though willows will cut easier than most. 2" is not too big of a deal, maybe the skid steer hydraulic cutters are more suited...I don't know.
I will say that willows will come back with a vengeance if not killed with poison or dug out. You would end up with a very thick stand of willow bushes within the season. It sounds like you will be digging that area out to expand the pond...I would deal with the willows with the excavator rather than chopping them to bits first.
I would deal with the willows with the excavator rather than chopping them to bits first.
Agree 100%. I'm very much in favor of mechanical rather than chemical control when it makes sense, and in a case like this, mechanical control makes sense for a lot of reasons.
If I was compelled to take on a stand of 3" sprouts with a bush hog, it would be a rented bush hog attached to a rented tractor.
In a situation like this one clearing the brush with a dozer is a no-brainer.
There is a lot of grading that needs done around the house and along both creeks, so that will eat up a lot of the excavated dirt. Not sure how much excess I will have after all of that, but I will have to figure that part out before we start digging.
Thanks for the input on the willows, if I went after them it would definitely be a rented skid and rented brush hog (priced that out for less than $400 for 24 hours and no hour limit), but piling them up with the dozer makes good sense, especially if I end up removing them before I get going on the pond expansion. Wouldn't make much sense at all to deal with them twice.
RC51 gives a 10 step method for posting pics through PB about 5 posts down.
This works well IF you are posting from a desktop computer. Posting from a phone is beyond me, but you are half way there since you have managed getting the PB photo link "Pond.PNG" to show up in your original post.
If you use Chrome, you can open the photo that was linked in the post and copy the address from the address bar rather than right clicking to go to properties. This applies to RC's Step #8.
It seems cumbersome at first, but after a few successful tries it gets to be second nature.
there are 3 ways. 1. Simply use the tool under the posting box to attach a file directly below your post. Folks can't see picture unless they click on the attachment. Advantage is that the picture stays on the forum as it is literally saved with the message and always can be downloaded later. Probably most reliable way to go but user has to add a step to see the pictures.
2. use the 'embed picture' tool that is on the full screen view when composing messages to post. This means you have to already have the picture hosted online somewhere and have to be able to paste that address in the embed picture tool. This is a little risky since online hosting of pictures is a fluid thing and for a while all the photobucket hosted pictures were gone. This was a big nuisance for many of the very useful older threads. Photobucket is still free and is back now but you get a watermark 'photobucket hosted' on your pictures.
3. To have the picture be attached to the message AND show up in the body of your post then you have to follow instructions above.
6/27/2019 update: I’ve been fishing the pond and set a minnow trap and so far only bullhead and GSF and very few in numbers. Pretty sure it had a bad winter kill as I found several floaters this spring. I’ve decided to use the pond for grow out of some RES and FH (added today). Let them grow out this summer and then hopefully drain the pond this fall and add them to my dads LMB/BG pond about 10-15 miles away. I also added some tilapia to see if they make a dent in the FA issue, but I only put in 40 so I’m not sure they will. Caught 4 of the crayfish in the below photos today, anyone care to venture an educated guess on species?
Adding 40 tilapia to 0.1 ac should pretty quickly notably reduce a pretty heavy FA problem. That equates to 400/ac. If there were 5 fish (4"-6")/lb is 80lb/ac; 3.5 fish/lb(6"-8") that is 114lb per ac and 2 fish of 6"-9" per lb is 200lb/ac. Generally 30-40 lb per ac is used. Please try to get a current pic of the pond's FA and keep track of the algae reduction rate and then post another picture for reference and a reader education.
The crayfish could easily be a northern crayfish as noted by quarter acre. Thanks
Last edited by Bill Cody; 06/28/1905:53 PM.
aka Pond Doctor & Dr. Perca Read Pond Boss Magazine - America's Journal of Pond Management
Thanks for the link QA. Northern was my best guess based on other reading I had been doing, and that's what I come to from that chart to. They don't seem to be burrowing, so probably not a bad species to have around.
Bill, I will try to remember and get some close up pictures over the weekend. I sprayed the cattails this last week so there may be some FA die off from that, but otherwise I haven't treated them at all so it should give a decent idea of what the tilapia are managing. They went in the week of June 10th at about 1 inch long, so it may take a bit before they are of a good enough size to make a dent. I guess we will see on that part.
Tilapia at 1" and only 40 of them IMO will not produce a fast reduction of FA. We will see the results if you keep us updated. Chemical stuff that kills cattails will have very little if any affect on the filamentous algae.
aka Pond Doctor & Dr. Perca Read Pond Boss Magazine - America's Journal of Pond Management
Snapped a few pics of the pond yesterday. Water came up about a foot overnight, I would say its been about 60% covered by FA, but only looks like about 50% or so right now.
Also found a decent supply of the craws in the below pic nearby. Based on the ID link above I am led to White River, but I don't know if that's accurate or not. Anyone with a better idea please chime in!
Turns out there are more GSF that I thought. Had 2 minnow traps set yesterday and pulled out 12 of them. Saw a big group of them schooled up on some shallow gravel so I figured they were spawning. Emptied the traps and some of them are HUGE with eggs. Also saw a small school of FHM from the recent stocking up shallow, hopefully they are looking to spawn soon as well.
Made the first step towards aeration yesterday, had a trencher rented to install some drain tile, ended up trenching in 225' of conduit down to the dock area (pic below). Not sure if it will get air line or electrical, but I think I have the "boss" talked into electrical in case we want lights down at the dock when I get that rebuilt.
Can anyone help with a fish ID? Caught this guy on a small ice fishing jig cast out along the FA today. Is this a Golden Shiner? Would be great as they are somewhat hard to source locally from what I've experienced so far. Caught this guy along with a few creek chubs and a nicer sized GSF (6-7"). There is a "breach" in the embankment around the pond where the old overflow used to be. The previous owners wanted the cattails out and have it dug out to remove them and never replaced that section (about 2-3' lower than the rest of the dam), so the creek to the north floods in here. I'm assuming that's where the creek chubs (and probably several of the other species) are coming from.
Mommy pulled the little man by just in time for him to handle his first creek chub. Surprisingly it went back in relatively unscathed .
Well my plans to renovate the pond this spring were...."adjusted" slightly. Shortly after my last post above we found out that number 2 was on the way. She was born happy and healthy just a couple weeks ago, but hospital bills mean the bank account isn't nearly as happy or as healthy. Through some more sampling (my little guy is 2 now and LOVES to feed, trap, and catch fish at the pond), I've figured out there is a strong population of various minnow species in the pond, from the FHM I stocked to GSH and Creek chubs from when the nearby creek flooded. I decided to stock some YP to give us some "desirable" fish species in there until we actually get the renovation done, supplier thought he would have them in this weekend along with a couple pounds of FHM. I figure I'll just have a fish fry when it gets time for the full redo!
We had a 6ac pond about 75 years old. DOT widens road and took away old damn. Dug a borrow pit of approx 5 ac. Rebuilt damn for 11ac pond. Pond refilled and we stocked bream and shell cracker December 2018 and F1 bass June 2019. My question is: the pond has always had shiners. Is it reasonable to assume that as long as shiners are in good supply, we don’t need to cull any bass?
I'll get some up of the area as soon as we thaw out a bit. EDIT: Found a picture of the backyard from when they listed the property. Not a great picture, but you can see the little watering hole and all of the willows back behind. You can also see the pile of broken concrete they left for me which will be put to good use at some point.
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