Project pond reconstruction

[Sage_Flyguy]

Hey Everyone,

It's finally time. I have a pond here out my front door that is about 60' x 80' ( rough guesstement). It's been here for +30 years has a creek year round flowing into it. When the pond was originally built it was around 7' deep or so , now after all the years of sediment flowing into it from the ponds up stream its only about 4 or 5' if that. My neighbor is going to bring over his excavator we are going to add about 30' of width to it and shoot for 15' in depth.

Now on to the Questions , this pond was never stocked but every year a bunch of bluegil and Bass just show up in it late in the summer. The Bass never get any size to them , I think the biggest Bass I have ever saw or caught out of my ond was in the 13" range.

Just the mere fact of there being so much more room , should that help with the size of my Bass ? When we drain it to start construction is there any good way to try and get the Bass out of it to Keep and re-plant , or do you think they will naturally just show up again ? Also if I can't figure out a way to keep the bass and decide to buy live fish , should I make this a trout pond due to water flow and ultimately the Price of bass being much more expensive ? Any thoughts on Catfish ? And lastly what if ( hypothetically of course ) a person who had said pond , also just so likely lived within a couple miles of a river that produces Mass amount of Crawdad and somehow several hundred of those crawdad ended up in his pond as a food source for bass , catfish , trout etc ?

One of the sad things , there are several ponds in my area with large bass and as kids we always had permission to fish them. The new owners at one time let people still fish these ponds but over the years people kept leaving trash down there and then vandalized some equipment. Now everyday to work I drive by these ponds that nobody touches anymore , its sad what a few bad seeds can do for everyone else.

Anyways in about a week we will begin construction on the pond , I will be sure to give updates and add pictures. It's nice having a Neighbor that owns a excavating company.

Later Guys
Jer

 

[tomriker]

if you end up "stocking" it later with bought fish you will have to have ways to keep the fish from getting out, or you could get in big trouble, the bass that are in there might be stunted, and will never get big, but who knows when you drain it there may be some 5-10 pounders??? especialy with an endless supply of craws! if the fish don't look stunted when you drain it, i'd say try to keep as many of them alive as you can! goodluck, show us some pics of what's in there

when it's done, you it should be more than deep enough to support a few big fish, try sinking/making underwater structure, or even with the backhoe, dig holes like 3-4 feet deep all over on the bottom of it to give more contour, that will help you later beable to catch the bass because they will hold in those holes/breaks better than if it's just a fishbowl shap. you can buy fingerling trout too for pretty cheap, that'd be a good source to feed the bass too, help em get nice and fat!

 

[Sage_Flyguy]

I forgot to Mention that I have a culvert feeding the pond that I plan on Screening , then after itsa drained we are putting in another culvert on the out going. Hopefully that will help keep whats in IN and whats out OUT. Also did I mention that I plan on harvesting all my Large Bass from this pond just outside of Albany , if you happen to notice a depletion of 5 and 6lb bass TR , I assure you I dont know anything about it lol.

Jer

 

[tomriker]

you don't want my fish, they all have fungus, unless you treat them first they will just infect all yours too

 

[Hendo30]

Pretty cool to be able to have your own pond or ponds. Sounds like a fun reconstruction and project. Good luck and keep us posted, I will be looking for updates. Thanks for sharing.

 

[Sage_Flyguy]

It looks like the draining will begin this weekend if all goes well and then the atual digging will start mid July sometime after it dries up a little down there. I will get some photos of that process as we get to them. Here is what the pond looks like right now.

 

[Spydeyrch]

It looks like the draining will begin this weekend if all goes well and then the atual digging will start mid July sometime after it dries up a little down there. I will get some photos of that process as we get to them. Here is what the pond looks like right now.

That is one sweet little creek that you have there!! That would be pretty sweet to stock it would trout and not bass. You could control the out end of the pond so that the stockers couldn't get out but they could go upstream and spawn, hopefully, and thys you would have a self-sustaining trout population. That would be pretty nifty if you ask me!!

Good luck on the project and keep us posted man!!

-Spydey

 

[tomriker]

or stock it with trout to FEED the bass??

 

[cowboysfan]

The water temp year round would be a big factor in a trout population. You are lucky to have this kind of dilemma on your hands. will be fun to follow this thread for a couple years to see how it all works out.

 

[Sage_Flyguy]

Alright guys ,

Here comes another update , Saturday afternoon a buddy of mine and a OFF member Jesse ( who has only posted like once ) showed up with his Backhoe. Pretty much all we did that day was drain the pond , well down to a little creek now. Going to have to wait for it to dry up a bit before we will be able to get the excavater down in there to start doing some real work. I took a handful of pictures to share with you all. The most suprising things of the drain I knew at one time I had saw one or 2 little tiny crawdads in the creek area , when we drained it the pond was loaded with them , so I took a picture of one of them I think posing for the camera. Another suprising thing was how much Silt has accumulated over the +30 years this pond has been there , it is probably right around 6 feet of pure silt that has been choking out the depth of my pond. And lastly , not one bass was seen during or after the drain , I am convinced for whatever reason the Bulk of my fish leave , then new onws show up from up river yearly. we did see a handful of bluegils , lots of frogs , tons of crawdad as mentioned earlier and some sort of bug , like dragonfly larvae walking around.

 

[Sage_Flyguy]

Alright guys the Pond is finally done , well with the major construction that is. I still havent got the flat sections leveld off yet and smooth out for the fire pit and the deck isn't built yet. None the less the Pond is dug out to its final size and depth. It's roughly between 1/4 - 1/3 acre and 7 feet deep or so. It ended up being a bit shallower than I had originally hoped for but we hit bedrock and well you can guess the rest. Construction started Thursday morning at 7:30 am and was finsihed that night by 7pm. This time of year the creek is moving pretty slowly it took a good 2 full days to fill up now I am hoping within a week or so it should clear up.

This morning a friend of mine went and picked up 15 or 16 Bluegill and dumped into my pond. I called a warmwater fish stocking place applied for the fish transporting permitt which he said should take about 2 weeks. After which I am purchasing 25 Largemouth Bass , 50 channel catfish and 15 Black Crappie. I am sure it will take a few years before the bass fishing in my pond is very good but I am hoping by next summer the bluegill and crappie fishing will be fun.

Anyways here are a few pictures I have taken of the pond with my phone , its so difficult to get in a spot to capture the whole thing , but you all should be able to get the idea.

Thanks for letting me share with you all
Jer

 

[Throbbit _Shane]

Nice pond! How big are the bass that you are purchasing gonna be?

 

[Sage_Flyguy]

Nice pond! How big are the bass that you are purchasing gonna be?

Fingerlings , I think Luke said up to 4" or up to 6". Buying bass gets quite spendy once they consider them not fingerlings anymore. $2.00 for a fingerling up to the 4" or 6" and then after that the price is $2.00 an inch. So 10" bass would run me $20.00 a fish. I am getting another 10 or so Bluegill this coming week. I don't know if the Transport will keep them from spawning this year or if they have already spawned or not.
I was quoted to buy Bluegill from where I am buying the bass , crappie and catfish. That I would want 15 or so Adult Bluegill at least and at $.75 an inch I refuse to buy 15 bluegil for around $112.