I have Water Primrose getting started in my old refurbished 1 acre pond. It was pretty thick before cleaning the pond out, and now it is just started coming back. There are single sprigs about 2-3' long scattered out maybe ten feet apart around 2/3 of the shore line. Picture below of typical size.
I've read this old thread
Water Primrose control and this one.
Water primrose The pond is in sore need of some shoreline habitat for fish recruitment. No other aquatic rooted weeds that I know of yet. Water level has been low and now higher with recent rains, so some land based weeds/grass are providing some temporary habitat but they will be gone by spring.
The second link above gives some pretty good discussion of the benefits and problems associated with WP. Thought I would go ahead and ask some opinions on its use as shore line fish habitat. It looks like there are three options to managing it.
1. Kill every sprig I see next spring by hand or chemical and try to get something else established.
2. Let it do its thing till it gets too thick, then remove or kill some of it back
3. Selectively control sections of the bank so some areas are fish-able and other areas are cover for the fish.
Leaning towards the third option. Would like others opinions and their experience with WP.
My wife took a few sprigs of it this spring and put in a little concrete pool that is up against our house with goldfish in it. I got to observe close up its growth and the way it sends roots down into the water. It even bloomed with the pretty yellow flowers. It looks like tremendous fish fry and fingerling habitat for some protection from predators. It looks like it could go crazy and get out of control without regular control maintenance.
