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Post by squirrelhunter on Mar 20, 2014 8:17:48 GMT -5
Because of the bad winter I lost a lot if not all of my fish.I'm not quite sure because I haven't seen any crappie yet or all the catfish I stocked last spring but I still have some to clean out. Here's some of what I've gotten out so far,the 1 carp broke the rod on my new landing net,it measures just a tad over 30".  |
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Post by featherduster on Mar 20, 2014 10:21:39 GMT -5
Sorry to hear about your fish kill. Several years ago I lost all my catfish I had been raising in a small pond due to thick ice and extended snow cover. The pond sat down in a depression to far away from any electrical source to allow an aerator.
The following year I restocked 5"-7" cats and once again the next winter I lost them all.
The first batch I lost were averaging 5 pounds they were a great food source as well as fun to catch.
I have another much larger pond that doesn't freeze completely so from now on my catfish stocking as well as other species is being done in that pond.
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Post by esshup on Mar 20, 2014 12:09:41 GMT -5
The only way to prevent winterkills is to keep the biomass very low in the pond, or have an aeration system in place to keep the water open in an area. You can have a summerkill too, that usually happens at night when the plants need the O2 to live.
The things that are placed in the pond is called a diffuser. That makes the tiny bubbles. For winter, they should be placed at the 1/4 total pond depth mark, and close enough to shore to allow anything that goes in the water to get to shore to get out. For the summer, the diffuser(s) should be in the deepest part of the pond.
Properly designing and placing an aeration system is a little bit more complicated than throwing something in the pond that makes bubbles, and while the good systems aren't cheap, they really help the ponds. They increase the number of fish you can have in the pond, help reduce the amount of muck that builds up on the pond bottom. Not only is it the cost of the fish that die during a winter/summer kill, think of the time it takes to get them to that size. Typically it's the largest fish that go first.
I prefer the electric compressors, I've seen ponds that had windmill aeration systems and still had a fish kill - you need the aeration the most during cloudy, no wind days. You'd be suprised how far you can push air if you don't have electric near the pond. One client is pushing air almost 1,000 feet to his ponds.
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Post by seindianahunter on Mar 21, 2014 14:48:13 GMT -5
I had some winter kill in my pond as well. I count almost 200 dead in my 3/4 acre pond this week, bluegill and bass of every size. There were still some swirls in the water as i walked around, so it was not a complete loss. It was probably over populated anyway. I was surprised because it is 10'-11' deep in the middle. This is only the third winter that I have owned the pond and it has several downed tree limbs in it. I don't know if that has any effect on oxygen levels or not. Anyway, the coons are eating well this spring.
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Post by throbak on Mar 21, 2014 17:45:16 GMT -5
Jefferson County SWCD is having a Fish sale this spring call 812 273 7609
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Post by squirrelhunter on Apr 16, 2014 9:30:09 GMT -5
I ordered the fish yesterday,it should be 4-5 weeks he said.
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Post by squirrelhunter on May 21, 2014 8:38:37 GMT -5
The pond is re-dug deeper again and it's stocked with fish,now just to wait on them to grow  . |
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