Progress notes on Dad's trophy bluegill pond.

[Bruce Condello]

I don't know if it's the barley straw or the aeration system--or likely both--but right now the pond has secchi readings of over 3 meters. This is unheard of on any of the ponds on my farm. I have some Earthtec ready and available for the beginnings of an algae bloom, but maybe I won't have to use it for awhile. The fish are all basically still tiny. Way too little to provide a fishing experience. Maybe we're close to two years away from having a good fishery.

249 bluegill that are 3-4 inches.
35 slightly bigger age-2 bluegill
125 yellow perch that are also quite small. Maybe 5-8 inches.
4 steelheads just for the fun of it. They'll probably last another week or so until we harvest them out.

The feedings are very enthusiastic at least. :-)

I used the Earthtec (buffered copper sulfate) on the sediment/nutrient pond yesterday and I'll check it tomorrow to see if there was an effect. The secchi readings were .4 meter yesterday.

[Bruce Condello]

I wish I had the camera last night. We caught a couple of fish that would have had, in my estimation, Wr's in the neighborhood of 140+. I'd better get those pictures.

[Theo Gallus]

"Anybody think I should post a picture of one of those really fat male age-1 fish?"

Juvenile obesity is a serious matter in this country. Of course we need pictures!

[Bruce Condello]

Water quality rapidly improving now that we've almost gone two days without rain. Clarity sits at 17 inches.

[Bruce Condello]

Thank goodness for a little break in the weather! We're ten inches over normal rainfall, but the last 24 hours have been drier, and the water is beginning to clear up. There is evidently one steelhead left. Saw him feeding tonight. Still lots of little bluegill. Nice body condition, but still too small to put up a serious tussle. Lots of them runnin' around 5-6 inches, but a couple of small males that looked like they had eggs they were so fat. Pretty impressive. Anybody think I should post a picture of one of those really fat male age-1 fish? Water clarity was back up to about 13 inches. I'd love to see it about 30 inches someday.

[Bruce Condello]

It continues to rain time and time again. We're now about six inches over normal for the year, and Dad's pond looks muddy as can be. Very sad. The good news is that the fish continue to feed agressively. Evidently the water quality is acceptable in every other respect. Dad and I have discussed the possibility of harvesting some of the little tiny yellow perch for a good meal. Kayla and I harvested two on Sunday, and they were absolutely delicious. They were between 6 and 9 inches.

[Bruce Condello]

Secchi readings, which had dropped to 10 inches after the big rains have improved to 14 inches at this time.

[Bruce Condello]

Fishing is not very good at Dad's pond right now. There is currently a tremendous band of rooted vegetation around the entire periphery of the pond. The species are horned pondweed, which makes up the band closest to shore, then there is the sago pondweed, which is a little deeper. The good news is that when you grab a wad of the weeds and observe the inhabitants you will find dozens of damselfly nymphs and chironomids. I think there is a lot to eat for all those little bluegill. Hopefully this will springboard these fish to pellet eating size.

Feedings are still enthusiastic, and there is still one steelhead that hasn't been caught. I'm amazed that he is still eating like crazy every evening.

I'm debating the possibility of manually removing some of the vegetation so that Dad has a nice clear area in front of his dock.

[Bruce Condello]

Dad's trophy bluegill pond took a beating a couple of nights ago! The pond received almost four inches of rain in a fairly short period. I checked it today and the visibility had plummetted from 24 inches down to 12 inches. It looked very turbid indeed. The bluegill that went in at 4-5 inches are now stocky 5-6 inchers. They've been feeding very well, and even after all the rain took some pellets today. I plan to be out at his pond every minute that I can over the next few months.

The barley straw that I added early in the spring appears to be doing it's job. I'm keeping meticulous data on algae levels, and plan to write an article at some future date. The aeration also appears to be helping, as I haven't found a single mortality since it was installed.

I'm ready for the rain to stop.

[Bruce Condello]

Water temperatures are now consistently in the upper 50's to about 60 degrees. All of the bluegill are feeding actively, but the smaller bluegill are much more agressive. The big bluegill are "sippers", and take a much more cautious approach to pellet feeding. It rained 1.5 inches two nights ago so the water clarity has dipped from 3 meters down to about 1 meter. This does not seem to have affected the fish's hunger. I had a GBH pay a visit to me while I was working on the pond. I am installing a security system. The heron has been leaving footprints on the edge of the pond so I'd assume he's been fishing. We installed another electric wire layer of security in the area of the footprints to try to discourage him. Obviously they are illegal to shoot, but I wish I had one of those propane cannons to freak him out a little bit.

[Bruce Condello]

Two of the steelheads have been harvested. I'll post a picture. They are awesome fish, but one of the two we harvested had over 100 pellets in it's belly! I'm sure the bluegill are getting pushed off the feeding grounds by these maniacal steelies. My secchi readings are around 3 meters as of last night. I'd like them to ultimately stabilize around 1 meter, because that's a great clarity for predators like bluegill (yes, I said bluegill), but not so clear as to indicate a lack of primary productivity, which is a measure of the amount of phytoplankton and zooplankton in the water. This is crucial so that the fish aren't subsisting entirely on pellets. In order to grow huge bluegill you need to have a natural component to the diet. I can't stress this enough.