Finally got out on the "kayak/sup" to view the pond post winter storm.

Water was quite clear. Went around the roughly 8 acre pond 3 times.

Did not see one tilapia or rio grande perch.

Normally when the temp is that warm the big tilapia are busy cruising the surface grazing and rio grande perch are also visible.

It appears the winter storm may have killed out both of them. Will know more on that in the next two months.


Also not seeing as many bass as we have in previous years. Two years ago you could go out and catch 2-3 dozen 1lb bass during spawn and post spawn.

My nephew fishes it quite often and is telling me he is lucky if he even catches a dozen in an outing.
This has me curious as to whether the pond may have had some type of slight turnover. It was low in the fall.


POSITIVE NEWS:
Seen a lot of bluegill!
Actually saw groups of native bluegill in what looked like standoffs with the bass guarding their hatches along the cattails that line the dam.
Did see some shiner minnows in the shallows of which we released in there last January.

Last week we released some small copper-nose bluegill in the very back where it is shallow and they have plenty of cover.


Our main objective is to get it stocked with bluegill.

Both fish are extreme warm weather fish and cannot survive in cold weather. This past freeze has taken it's toll on the Rio Grande Cichlid. Unless there is a good running spring feeding your pond the chances of survival are slim to none.

Cold hit one of my ponds hard. It’s about an acre and had bass, bluegills, green sunfish and hybrid stripers. But, certainly not overstocked. The water turned dark green with almost no fish surviving. Ph and alkalinity both very low. Due to the terrain, no way I can get a lime truck in. It’s still green a week later. So far, I’ve put in 7 pounds of fathead minnows. Those things could live in a nuclear waste dump. Test throw on feeder gets about 6 or 7 bluegills to feed.

The odd thing is that I have another pond, much smaller and more shallow a mile away. About 1/4 acre. It has channel cats, bluegills and green sunfish. No problem there. A creek, also shallow, has no problem. Fish feed voraciously as expected.

Ph and alkalinity are good in all 3 places.

Somehow, I will probably get about a ton of lime and a gas powered pump with hose and nozzle to spread it.

Never heard of cold water doing that DD...but then I don't have a lot of experience with the frigid air we got this year.
I think I would get a local outfit to haul out a load of ag. lime and dump it in strategic inflow spots around the pond. It will likely take a lot more than 1 ton .

Have you seen that approach carried out and followed the progress of a pond for a while afterwards? I always give that as a 3rd or 4th best option for tough-to-reach ponds but I rarely... actually now that I think of it, never have gotten to see the long-term result of liming the tributary/inflow only. Better than nothing I'm sure, just don't know how it plays out.

LOL...seen it carried out? It is an integral part of my pond management program...and has been for about 40 years...is that long-term enough?

I had the water tested and the green is simple algae but a helluva lot of it. No idea how or why. Recommendation is Cutrine Plus for that. My smaller pond, 1/4 acre is/was also affected. I started by spraying the outer areas of the small pond. Then would come back and do the middle. Need Grandsons or other help to paddle Jon boat while spraying the now 2 acre bigger pond since the 4 inch rain I got a couple of days ago.

Now that the water has had a little time to mix, I’ll give it a little more time to find out what the status is. That 4 inch rain essentially doubled the water volume in both ponds.

Several unknowns at work here. Never had this problem on my own place.