Pond Boss Forums INTRO New Forum Member Introduction New member from Central Arkansas

Hello all, what a great site. So I thought this is simple dig a hole fill with water and onto fishing . Didn't actually think it would be quite that simple but also didn't know what all was involved. Looking forward to learning from all of you. Can anyone suggest a good book on pond water quality and how to test and treat. I built a pond a few years ago that would have been about 2 acres and 12' deep at the dam there was only 5' of drop from one end to the other so it was mostly a dug pond. Well I said would have been because before I could complete the spillway it came a flood and cut the dam so it ended up being about 1 acre and 6' deep. I was also building a house and didn't have the time to repair until this summer. I was in the process of enlarging the pond and coming up an additional 4' on the dam and just my luck got rained out again and couldn't complete. I still need to remove about 2' of dirt over about an acre to maintain 6' of water depth on the upper end and 16' at the dam and will be about 4 acres total when complete. I have a temporary drain in where the dam was cut before to keep the level down until I can finish the dirt work on the upper end will probably be late August before I can get back in there. Do you think I could go ahead with stocking some flathead minnows to get a head start? Its going to be bare ground all around the pond so is going to stay muddy, will this be a problem for the minnows spawning? All I have for cover now is quite a few stumps scattered thru out the pond. When complete will add rock and busted up concrete around the bank.

Muddy water has very limited fish productivity, however there is limited base of the food chain that develops in muddy water. Look at the turbidity in the Mississippi River. IMO at this point you can stock around 5 lbs of fathead minnows and you will see some reproduction by the time you complete final construction.

Thanks for the info Bill. Will they need to be feed pellets? If so how much?

Buy this book:

https://www.pondboss.com/item.asp?id=163&r=store%3Fc%3D8


Otto's book, "Just Add Water", is a "go to" for building ponds. His 50+ years experiences can help you get where you want to go.

Water chemistry around Malvern is actually pretty good. Once you finish the project and have more water, then you can do some homework to figure out if it needs to be changed.

I'd not stock any fish until you finish construction and know that it will hold water, and your water is "happy". Minnows are cheap, especially 5 pounds as Cody suggests, but I'm of the mindset to go through the process of finishing construction, then decide what to do about fish.

Thanks Bob, I just watched a couple of video's you did on ponds. Very informative and entertaining also. I subscribed to Pond boss and ordered Just add water or perfect pond don't remember which. My pond will be about 4 acres and I plan to dig a ditch from the deep end to the shallow end 6' wide and 3 or 4 feet deeper than the bottom with stumps lining the edge and the root ball overhanging the edge. I also dug several holes that I put stumps around.. I think the soil here is a sandy loom and it seems to hold water pretty well. My dam got cut before I could finish the spillway so the water that remained was in the dug portion of the pond. I'm going to relocate the spillway this time so it goes over virgin ground instead of over the dam where the wet weather branch is located.