Ponds, fish, and Great Blue Heron

[Sawyer Rob]

That makes sense. If you are going to feed your fish, then they will concentrate in one place and make it easy for a heron to catch them. Sounds like what happens with koi and goldfish ponds.

I don't feed the fish in my ponds... BUT, every year I find my bigger fish dead, speared by a heron and too big for them to end up with...

I don't need my bigger fish speared and left to die, I'd rather get rid of what spears them! AND I absolutely don't need all my frogs to disappear either... A friend of mine lost all of his frogs in one summer...

He saw a heron spear one and told me about it, he's not so happy now. He thought if he lost a frog or two, no big deal, but they are ALL gone now and he's shooting herons, hoping he can get more frogs for his pond.

SR

 

[scdeerslayer]

If there was a way to trap the turtles and transplant them, I'd do it.

Attached is a picture of a simple turtle trap you can build. Make a 4 foot square of 6" PVC pipe and build a wire cage underneath. Put a board across the top and fasten ramps on either end of the board, maybe even use hardware cloth on the ramps to help the turtles climb them. Turtles climb on top of the board to sun themselves, then when they go back into the water they fall into the cage and can't climb out.

 

[boggen]

Attached is a picture of a simple turtle trap you can build. Make a 4 foot square of 6" PVC pipe and build a wire cage underneath. Put a board across the top and fasten ramps on either end of the board, maybe even use hardware cloth on the ramps to help the turtles climb them. Turtles climb on top of the board to sun themselves, then when they go back into the water they fall into the cage and can't climb out.

View attachment 510355

*rubs chin* wonder what some snapping turtles would think of that trap.

 

[MossRoad]

There are a lot of good videos on youtube regarding floating turtle traps. They are easy to make and work very well. You could pen in the turtles until the pond renovation is complete. But you'd have to provide food, water, cover, protection from predators, etc....

floating turtle trap - Google Search

 

[check]

It depends on how good a swimmer you are sir. If you can't swim across it easily it's a lake. If yes, it's a pond.

Interesting definition! Now, what if there are 2 foot long Trout in the lake/pond?

 

[drssg]

My experience matches those who have not had a problem with herons.

On a slightly different note, if I had it to do over again, I might wait a few years before stocking the pond, just to see what shows up. I had quite a few fish in my pond before it was a year old. This was shortly before the fishery was scheduled to stock it, so I didn't cancel the order.

I didn't realize that water fowl bring fish eggs into a pond. Maybe it was the heron? ;-)

 

[MossRoad]

This is a lake with 2' long trout....

 

[Sawyer Rob]

Interesting definition! Now, what if there are 2 foot long Trout in the lake/pond?

There was a day when we had 2 foot long trout in one of our ponds... Swimming in that pond was no big deal, trout or not...

SR

 

[CajunRider]

Interesting definition! Now, what if there are 2 foot long Trout in the lake/pond?

Sir you have no problem unless you are skinny dipping among piranhas.

 

[dmccarty]

Contact your state Extension service for farm pond information. The NC Extension office had some good information on farm ponds, how to maintain them, how to stock with fish, etc.

From what I can remember, smaller ponds are kinda a PITA from a fish keeping perspective since it was hard to balance the size of the fish and the fish population. You could have a predator fish like a bass eat most of the of the smaller fish and end up with a couple big fish.

Anyway, the extension service has some good advice for the right price.

Later,
Dan