Pond Boss Forums POND CONSTRUCTION Creating habitat My Second Pond: Structure

This is how I am building and placing structure in the pond built per "My Second Pond: Groundbreaking!" which is to be stocked with SMB/YP/RES according to "My Second Pond: Stocking Plan, Strategy, and Tactics"

The built-in dirt structure includes two sets of two-tier flats for SMB Beds, a submerged island, and a large area intended for easy seining. The dirt structure can be seen in photos linked to above and probably more clearly in photos to follow.

This weekend we built the spawning beds for SMB. (See SMB Spawning Bed Preparation in the archives for more details on how to do this). There are a total of 25 beds, which is probably beau coup overkill for a 1/2 acre pond, but that's how using up the space and native rock I had set aside worked out. Since the beds are in two different locations (North side and South side), at two depths in each location (nominally 3' and 5' deep), I figure the SMB will hopefully pick and choose what works best for them each year based on water temperature, depth, etc. and be able to be at least somewhat successful in spawning each year. There is a log structure near the middle of the beds on each side of the pond, and next weekend I hope to work on placing root balls in between some of the beds to provide more woody cover for the spawning SMB and their fry.

The beds still need their "mattresses" of gravel placed inside them (except for one which is filled with hand-made pea gravel, carefully smashed from larger rocks by my daughter), but I can schlep that down into the basin later, by hand if it's too wet for
the front-end loader. I am trying to get all the jobs which really require machinery done while things are pretty dry.

I also placed some concrete and ceramic tiles in the pond, next to a large 5' diameter tile with hedgeapple (aka osage orange or bois d'arc) posts wired in place inside it, which I call the "pencil caddy." The tile and the caddy are just offshore from the submerged island, which my wife and daughter arranged some structure of their own on this weekend when they weren't helping with the SMB beds. For some reason, the submerged plateau is now known as "skull island."

Here are the SMB beds on the North side


and the South side of the pond


Here is the tile pile and the pencil caddy


located near Skull Island

That last picture is a classic! LMAO. Great work. Makes me want to live there.

Theo some cop is going to look in there during a clear water period and think you sunk a corpse.

Do the SMB beds have small rock in the inside?

This is exactly what happened when they created what we now call Stonehenge.
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Nice work, Theolonius. Someday, around 2085, they will be preparing to clear your property for a new Walmart when all of a sudden all construction will stop to call in ancient artifact experts. The question is: what social function will these experts determine was occuring at this excavation site?

Not yet, Eric, but they'll get about 5 gallons of pea gravel each, maybe with some #4 mixed in.

That thing in the last picture looks like the Demon/Statue from The Exorcist.

Freaky.

Don't you have gargoyles guarding your SMB beds?

Theo that gargoyle/skeleton structure is classic. Now all you need to do is put a sign on the bank that says "Trespassers will be utilized for pond structure."

I was going to ask you where you got you skeleton but then I though better of it.

The standard answer for that is animal or human sacrifice. :eek


Agreed! I bet Stonehenge was built by a guy with a sense of humor, and all the speculation is way off.

Is Stonehenge in a basin by any chance...........?

The skeleton is a nice touch.

Today I placed 8 root balls (pretty much the only ones small enough to handle with my front end loader) left from tree clearing in the SMB bed areas. Per research from ewest, SMB do best reproducing when there is wood near their spawning beds.

FYI, root balls don't roll in anything approaching a straight path.

I also placed 3 medium-sized empty wire spools in about 3' of water, for FHM spawning substrate. I have some pallets set aside which will go in a little later for the same purpose.

Got 20 tons of pea gravel delivered as well, for SMB spawning bed mattresses and parking area improvement next to my machinery barn.

Here are the SMB bed areas, with root balls, on the North side


and the South side of the pond.

the SMB KOA campgrounds in ohio LOL........excellent work.

there is one big rock in almost every pile......any significance to that?

It's called the initiator rock in the directions ewest referenced. I mentally call it the headstone (headboard) of the SMB bed; I think it tells Mr. & Mrs. Smallie how to orient themselves, sort of.

I'll tell you how it had the most significance to me. Most of the initiator rocks are so big that I was the only one who could move them. So I placed them all ahead of time, added bulk portions of smaller rocks, and turned the kids loose to build as many SMB beds as they wanted right where I wanted them to be.

I'm thinking about what might be the reaction of a poacher during a drought. Can you imagine sneaking into a place and seeing the gargoyle head sticking out of the water? I love it.

Got the SMB beds filled with pea gravel today. Added three beds made from cut-off plastic barrel ends, one at a vacant end on each side of the pond and one inside the log cabin. A cairn was added to Skull Island (see edited first post).

Here is one of the nicer looking SMB beds, completed:


Here is one of the barrel-end beds:

...and, we'll leave the light on for ya.

Great job Theo. In the sprit of full disclosure Bill Cody was the impetus for and did as much work as me WRT the SMB beds info. Thanks Bill.

Are you going to put a log near the shallower line of SMB beds on the south side?

They are rather farther from wood than the rest of the beds, aren't they? I've got lots of Hedge logs (ca. 175) left; I believe I'll take a look today and think about where a couple of logs on that side would fill in the holes. Of course, if I do that I'll probably add another log or two to the North side as well. Last night I figured out how I want to hold the log cabin down without needing a crane (I was previously thinking about putting our old front porch step - 8'x12"x12" of concrete and rebar - on top of it) or staking-and-wiring it down. I can switch the stake-and-wire material over to adding single logs in the bed areas. Need to see what logs on the pile look good for SMB beds (large) and bad for fence post use (crooked); it'll be nice if they're near the top layer.

Great stuff Theo. I wish I had your imagination and patience.

Here's an artist's rendering (haw haw) of my "stickups". They're just 3 foot lengths of 1" plastic pipe that float. I plug 1 end with clay for ballast, and they sink standing perfectly straight up. I have 1 bed of 21 now, but will add some more later.

Bob stake beds are an often recommended and use structure method.

ewest,

I thought about staking them into the bottom, but doubt I could hold my breath long enough.

I simply toss the pipes into the water, and they sink to the bottom and stand upright like tall, skinny weebles.

Wish I had made a few little gravel beds like Theo before my pond flooded.

I got my BG Condo Built! I also put in a half-dozen tire structures, added 5 logs to the upper SMB bed areas, and weighed the log cabin down with two 3' lengths of 5" steel pipe filled with concrete (don't-drive-in-my-yard pylons from a house in town; didn't work, and I picked them up after a couple of cars broke them off).

Nice looking stuff. How deep will the water be where that structure is?