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.

[Frosch]

Did you harvest the steelheads? By hook and line? If you have pics I would love to see them. What is a secchi reading and what would be a good reading.

[Bruce Condello]

On May 1st I visited my Dad's pond. It had been the second of two very warm days and the water temps had soared into the mid-sixties. The fish in my Dad's pond have been increased by 38 of the age-2 bluegills giving a total of 73. This will not yield any good fishing, but gives a good representation of fish for pulling off a good spawn. Hopefully in two years we have good numbers of medium sized bluegill to harvest a few for the dinner table. For now we'll just have to enjoy watching little 4 inch bluegill popping midges at the surface.