Pond Boss Forums MANAGING AN EXISTING POND Evaluating and adjusting fish populations Became a first time old pond owner

We just started construction on our new home and are living in a portable cabin till it’s done. We bought some family land and there are 3 ponds on the land that no one has seen in several years. I made my way to be able to clean up 2 of them. They are roughly 1/4 acres each. The 90 year old man that made them says there full of fish. Right now there full of lily pads. We have caught a few bass out of one of them and also blue gill. I’m working on the lily pads now and plan to try and restock once I get them done. The main pond I’m focusing on is in the middle. If one fills up they over flow to the next. The highest elevated one is pretty much a lose cause it’s grow up pretty bad. Does anyone have suggestions on what steps I need to take to get everything back to be a great pond. They were neglected for a long time and now I want To clean them up so my son can enjoy them. The aerial image isn’t exactly correct the top pond I can’t get to but it does look way better than the picture. It’s going to take sawing a lot of trees to get to it. The middle pond just has a lot of lily pads in the middle not the edges anymore but the bottom pond is full of lily pads and weeds.
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Welcome to the forum! I can’t see your pictures though. I think I would assess what fish are in there and what condition they are in. You may have to remove some instead of adding.... see what you have. Plenty to read on here to get ideas

Nuke the pads. However, don't try the whole thing at once. Rotting vegetation robs oxygen and this kills fish.. If you do about 1/4 at a time, the fish can go elsewhere until the area is normal. Then move on to another area.

I think it is best to leave a little bit for cover.

Check the depths of the ponds that you want to rejuvenate. Use a boat and a weighted rope or, if shallow enough, a pole of some type. Or just go swiming and bobbing up and down...if your into swimming in ponds. A shallow pond will ussually have vegitation troubles which can lead to constant upkeep to maintain it to your liking. Once you know the depths across the ponds, you may find that it is time to have them dug out or the dam heightened, or both.

If this kind of approach is not in your budget, you could apply hebicides on a yearly basis to some areas of the pond/s to keep some fishing holes open for the youngster. Lily pads are a favorite weed of mine to fish through with weedless top water frogs and weedless rubber worms.

With a set-up like that, I would consider making the middle pond a FHM, Scud, PK shrimp, & crawdad forage pond and concentrate on improving the lower pond first. This might mean killing the fish in the top two ponds first before stocking forage, but it could create one great pond at the bottom of the hill. The first pond would just be a settling pond to continue reducing the silting in of the others while the middle pond grew forage that would wash down to the "fishing pond" (or you could trap and siene forage and transfer to the fishing pond). That would be one cool set-up!

Welcome to the forums!