Hey, all. I hired a guy to expand our small cattle pond to use for fishing. The land was low and wet all the time so we figured this would turn a liability into an asset. I think the guy under-bid the contract because he abruptly ended the job short on my expectations. We were aiming for 2-3 acres and it ended up 1.25. The average depth was to be 6-8', but we are far from that. One channel of the pond barely touches 6' in one spot and the rest is 2-4' and one decent sized section is only 1' deep. He said he stopped because he was hitting shale and was afraid he would poke a hole in the bottom. I'm not sure I believe that because the area that was a foot deep was never touched by the bulldozer.
Is a pond this shallow going to properly support a fish population? My goal is BG and LMB. Originally I wanted CC too, but I'm not sure it'll be a great fishery for LMB given the size if I introduce CC as well.
A secondary issue... the contractor thought he was being nice by breaking the dam from the old pond once the expanded area of the new pond was complete, saving any of the existing fish. Unfortunately, there were white crappie in the old pond, so now I'm also battling them from taking over.
That said, I'm now wondering if it would be best to drain, dig deeper, and start over with the fish population.
Thanks in advance for any advice. If it helps, I'm in Hot Springs, Arkansas.
