Most of my pond has steep edges which has worked great to control weeds. It did a great job of digging the muck and peat/cattail roots out of the pond. I rented a rather large excavator with wide tracks, two yard bucket. I had some shallow weedy areas I wanted to get rid of and expand the size. Kasey, I just went through the same thing with my pond. I went around yesterday and threw all the rocks back in that were dredged out. Now I just need to get some structure back into the pond now that all the cattails are gone. This is the first time in 18 years that the pond has been dredged so I guess I can live with that. We have been treating it with bacteria to clean up the muck and nutrients and it seems to be doing an acceptable job.
It has always received excessive amounts of nutrients. The pond is located in what was the pasture and now is a corn field.
Now, they no longer have the elk and I will resort to herbicides to control the vegetation. I was hesitant in the past to use herbicides on the pond because my parents' elk may sneek into the pond and drink the water. It should be interesting to see what grows back in the years to come. I was afraid that one day the duckweed would cause a summerkill by by not allowing sunlight penetration. The cattails were limiting the wave action and allowing the duckweek to cover the pond.
My intentions on dredging the pond was to steepen the shorelines with the hopes of limiting the vegetation growth. This late in the growing season, I am hoping it will die off on its own soon. GW, I did not treat the pond for duckweek. Okay I edited all my pics with Picasa and hopefully everyone can see them now. Also, does anyone know of a good dredging/excavating company in SE Minnesota? I am looking for any input/opinions on my situation. I am afraid if I dredge that the only thing that will survive are the bullheads. The pond has some bluegills, crappie, LMB, SMB, walleye, and a couple unwanted bullheads. Would it be necessary to drain the pond in order to dredge it? The past couple years have been so dry that the water line has dropped below the weed line during the summer. I am hoping just to dredge the shoreline deep enough to limit the vegetation growth. Now, cattails and duckweed have moved in and I can no longer fish from shore. Thus, I installed an aeration system with two bottom diffusers and have used bacteria to clean up the pond. Originally, it was overgrown with sago pondweed, elodea, and filamentous algae. My parents no longer have the elk but the pond has become overrun with vegetation. It is located in my parent's elk pasture and receives the high nutrient runoff. It was originally excavated in 1989 and has a maximum depth of 9 feet. I have a 2/3 acre spring fed pond in SE Minnesota.
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