I think something drastic has happened to the pond I fish

[BrianMDTX]

The last bass I caught that was a decent size was May 4th of last year (over 3.5 lbs.). The last one that was over 5 lbs. was on April 16th. Since then it’s been dinks and maybe a two-plus pound bass. But the last bass I caught was on November 20th. Since then I’ve had two soft strikes (missed the hook up) and that’s been it. I haven’t seen anyone else catch anything except cats. I haven’t seen any dead bass, but something has changed. I’ve been fishing this pond since 2020 and I was catching 3+ lb. bass regularly with some 4 and 5 lb’ers mixed in as well. Now it’s just dead. 
 

It’s not stream-fed (just replenished by rain), but the water level has been high since summer. It’s got me stumped. I know we had that week of super-low temps last year in February, but as the pond did not ice over I can’t see that really having an affect. It’s got to be something else. 

[Skunkmaster-k]

Maybe they’re wise to a senko. 

[hokiehunter373]

17 minutes ago, BrianMDTX said:

The last bass I caught that was a decent size was May 4th of last year (over 3.5 lbs.). The last one that was over 5 lbs. was on April 16th. Since then it’s been dinks and maybe a two-plus pound bass. But the last bass I caught was on November 20th. Since then I’ve had two soft strikes (missed the hook up) and that’s been it. I haven’t seen anyone else catch anything except cats. I haven’t seen any dead bass, but something has changed. I’ve been fishing this pond since 2020 and I was catching 3+ lb. bass regularly with some 4 and 5 lb’ers mixed in as well. Now it’s just dead. 
 

It’s not stream-fed (just replenished by rain), but the water level has been high since summer. It’s got me stumped. I know we had that week of super-low temps last year in February, but as the pond did not ice over I can’t see that really having an affect. It’s got to be something else. 

It’s just you. Take a shower every once in a while man?

[Glenn]

Water is a medium. Everything that can dissolve into water, will. Remember that. For example, say your pond bottom soils have lots of limestone and iron. Both those minerals will dissolve into water, until saturated. Tree leaves fall into the water. You have stirred those shallow soils, and seen the black, mucky, stinky junk boil to the surface. Smells like rotten eggs. Water is slowly processing organic matter, allowing it to decompose and break down to the fundamental nutrients which make it up. 

 

As resilient as water is, don't be lulled into thinking it will respond as you wish. Water has natural limits. Push those limits and nature pushes back.

 

Think about it this way...different nutrients, minerals and metals dissolved into water will always be a stimulus for a natural reaction. Always. Add sunlight and temperature to water loaded with nutrients, and something will grow.

 

As rain flows over the ground and into your pond, it brings with it nutrients from things like fertilizers and animal waste.  That's a lot of phosphorus.  And you mentioned the water level is high from rainwater.

 

Now say this five times fast: For every pound of phosphorus present in your pond, 500 pounds of algae is produced!

 

You said your pond isn't stream-fed, which means water isn't moving through it.  That accelerates the issue because everything just accumulates, often beyond water's natural limits. That's when bad things start to happen. To keep these nutrients from compounding, you need to move water.

 

When you get too much nutrients and algae, you start to have oxygen and water quality issues, and your fish will suffer.

 

Sounds like you have the perfect recipe for a fish kill, if you haven't had it already.

[Sam]

Same thing happened to my double secret pond.

 

We used to pull five-pounders out of that pond on a regular basis for years. Now, to get a three-pounder is a blessing.

 

The farmer passed away three years ago and his brothers and nephews no longer do any pond maintenance and have oppened the far shallow end to the cows. So the food supply died off and the bass could not sustain themselves leaving only the dinks.

 

It is still fun to catch the dinks and try new lures but one must realize that the days of the big ones are over.

[BrianMDTX]

1 hour ago, hokiehunter373 said:

It’s just you. Take a shower every once in a while man?

I’m saving the water for the pond! 

[Brownbasser]

Try changing your tactics. Maybe they're biting, but it's too soft. Maybe, they are used to what you've been throwing. There are several different routes you could go, just experiment. You may find something you really like, in trying something new.

[BrianMDTX]

1 hour ago, Glenn said:

Water is a medium. Everything that can dissolve into water, will. Remember that. For example, say your pond bottom soils have lots of limestone and iron. Both those minerals will dissolve into water, until saturated. Tree leaves fall into the water. You have stirred those shallow soils, and seen the black, mucky, stinky junk boil to the surface. Smells like rotten eggs. Water is slowly processing organic matter, allowing it to decompose and break down to the fundamental nutrients which make it up. 

 

As resilient as water is, don't be lulled into thinking it will respond as you wish. Water has natural limits. Push those limits and nature pushes back.

 

Think about it this way...different nutrients, minerals and metals dissolved into water will always be a stimulus for a natural reaction. Always. Add sunlight and temperature to water loaded with nutrients, and something will grow.

 

As rain flows over the ground and into your pond, it brings with it nutrients from things like fertilizers and animal waste.  That's a lot of phosphorus.  And you mentioned the water level is high from rainwater.

 

Now say this five times fast: For every pound of phosphorus present in your pond, 500 pounds of algae is produced!

 

You said your pond isn't stream-fed, which means water isn't moving through it.  That accelerates the issue because everything just accumulates, often beyond water's natural limits. That's when bad things start to happen. To keep these nutrients from compounding, you need to move water.

 

When you get too much nutrients and algae, you start to have oxygen and water quality issues, and your fish will suffer.

 

Sounds like you have the perfect recipe for a fish kill, if you haven't had it already.

I won’t dispute any of that. All I can say is that the appearance of the pond seems to be the same as before. Same level of algae (low to moderate), same level of leaves on the bottom, etc. Maybe testing the water might show something. But if the bass had or were dying off, I would think I would see some evidence of that. 
 

I’m going to start to fish other places, but I’ll keep an eye on it. Especially starting in March as the spawn approaches. The pond is only two minutes from the house so it’s easy to check on it frequently. 

[DitchPanda]

 Every time I've seen a fish kill or at least a significant one for that matter there has been plenty of evidence.. Dead fish along shore, rotten fish stench being emitted from the body of water. I would assume you would have seen this evidence had it happened since you frequent the pond regularly.

 I'm in the mindset that you should change tactics..try a rugby head or light shaky head with a roboworm..that will get bites period if fish are present. Weedless Ned rig should work as well. Then once your satisfied that fish are still present and catch able move onto a big fish bait. In the past 5-6 years the most consistent bait for better than average fish has been some sort of flipping jig. You can find a head to match any situation..rock, wood or weeds.

 As @Glenn has eluded to your pond could be suffering from water quality\ oxygen issues but I'd sure think that after 2 months like this a kill would have occurred. This is just speculation based on what I've seen over the years I'm not a biologist so I'm no expert. I'm just guessing that if they were oxygen stressed to the point of little to no eating you would have seen some succumb to that stress by now.

 One other thing I'd add is if this pond is small and receives any decent amount of pressure the larger fish may have wised up some. I have a local pond that I've fished religiously for 20 years and I've seen this play out every year. From pres pawn thru spawn ill catch the biggest bass in this pond for a few weeks to a month. Then from June thru September you'd swear all the fish over 3-3.5lbs have died. Then starting again in October the 4s,5s all the way up to 7-8lbs start showing again.

 

[WRB]

When you say pond in Texas in lieu of tank it may be a small lake?

Approximately how many acres and depth is the “pond”.

Private or public? Public your local DNR can test the water quality.

Public the pond can get fished heavily depleting the population.

Does the pond have an aeration system or fountain?

Tom

[BrianMDTX]

Just to clarify, in the past two weeks I have casted:

 

weedless Ned rig

Senko wacky rig

Senko weightless Texas rig

Neko Macho Neko rig

weightless Zoom Trick and Mag 2 worms

Googan and Megabass jerkbaits

[GaryH]

I would try some live bait. Whatever the natural bait fish is in the pond and see what happens. Good luck

[BrianMDTX]

2 hours ago, WRB said:

When you say pond in Texas in lieu of tank it may be a small lake?

Approximately how many acres and depth is the “pond”.

Private or public? Public your local DNR can test the water quality.

Public the pond can get fished heavily depleting the population.

Does the pond have an aeration system or fountain?

Tom

I’d say it 3-5 acres in size. Shaped like a capital L. It’s a private community pond. It gets about 7’-8’ deep but the average  is 2’-4”. No aeration. 
 

It can receive some pressure, but 2020 was the most pressured and I did great. Was good in winter and spring of 2021 then it started to slow down. But nothing like this. 

1 hour ago, GaryH said:

I would try some live bait. Whatever the natural bait fish is in the pond and see what happens. Good luck

Hard to do. The turtles will take any live bait you throw unless it’s a shiner. 

[WRB]

If the pond has homes around with lawns, no aeration Glenn’s response is accurately predicting a ecosystem in decline. 

The pre spawn/ spawn cycle could start in a month with cruisers and males looking for bed sites. You will be able to see bass near shore in 3’ of water. 

The forage source is probably Bluegill, green sunfish and crawdads. Hope this pond doesn’t have any carp to eat the fish eggs.

Try convincing the community organization to add an aeration system.Without a aeration system the bottom debris will consume the oxygen and release harmful gases.

Tom

[RDB]

As you likely know, the majority of ponds in Texas are not spring fed or actively managed, yet typically hold bass unless they go dry.  As WRB said, what is the acreage and depth of the pond?  Is it public?  What kind of property is around it? What kind of habitat is present to support the food sources?  Are you seeing similar food source signs of life?  
 

While not explaining your lower success rates over the past few months, the drop in overall quality of bass could be an early sign of overpopulation.  Often the final manifestation of this is the head and body out of proportion but that is typically not the early sign.  You can get an idea by logging your catches by length.
 

Bass are pretty resilient and depending on the ecosystem, can adjust to outside influences fairly efficiently.  When I was young, we used to fish a deep pond on the property of a brick plant.  The pond was used as a dump site for broken and scrap bricks and had signs warning of dangerous sulfur levels and to not to keep or eat the fish.  We weren’t supposed to fish but kids will be kids.  Because fish were never removed, you could catch 50 bass in an afternoon but a 2 pounder was a toad.  That pond also greatly enhanced my eyesight as I now have a third eye on my forehead.

Edit:  I see you answered a few of the questions.

[BrianMDTX]

1 hour ago, WRB said:

If the pond has homes around with lawns, no aeration Glenn’s response is accurately predicting a ecosystem in decline. 

The pre spawn/ spawn cycle could start in a month with cruisers and males looking for bed sites. You will be able to see bass near shore in 3’ of water. 

The forage source is probably Bluegill, green sunfish and crawdads. Hope this pond doesn’t have any carp to eat the fish eggs.

Try convincing the community organization to add an aeration system.Without a aeration system the bottom debris will consume the oxygen and release harmful gases.

Tom

It’s definitely bluegills and crawfish. I’ve never seen any other fish but catfish. Some are 8-10 lbs. 

[DINK WHISPERER]

Same thing happened to a pond out in the middle of the woods that my son and I would fish. Biggest we caught their was 8.2lb. 

Well one day this drunk guy on an ATV saw ours parked out on the trail where we left it to walk in on foot. He found us and literally sat there making small talk watching us catch fish. Immediately after that we started finding beer cans, empty bait bags, trash, gun shells and even a broken rod there! 

The fishing slowly diminished through the course of over 2 yrs. Eventually we couldn't catch anything there, not a single bite. We thought for sure they had caught and kept everything in there! We decided to go diving this summer and guess what? So many bass still there! What I noticed is that the biggest ones we saw were on the south end of the pond in HEAVY vegetation. That side is not accessible on foot unless you had a boat but getting one to that pond is almost impossible. 

So, next experiment was to use live bait. The only forage in there are bluegill and hundreds of them. So we caught a few and tossed them out on dollar store balloons on our flipping sticks. Guess what? We immediately started slaying bass! The only thing I could conclude is that the huge amount of fishing pressure in such a small pond for such a long time made them stray away from artificial baits. I'll say the water is crystal clear and the maximum depth there during the rainy season is about 10 ft. You can easily see to the bottom in those depths. 

Now, that probably has nothing to do with your situation and I'm probably not right in my own either so take it for what it's worth. Just figured I would share and maybe get feedback from others as well. 

 

 

[TnRiver46]

17 hours ago, DINK WHISPERER said:

Same thing happened to a pond out in the middle of the woods that my son and I would fish. Biggest we caught their was 8.2lb. 

Well one day this drunk guy on an ATV saw ours parked out on the trail where we left it to walk in on foot. He found us and literally sat there making small talk watching us catch fish. Immediately after that we started finding beer cans, empty bait bags, trash, gun shells and even a broken rod there! 

The fishing slowly diminished through the course of over 2 yrs. Eventually we couldn't catch anything there, not a single bite. We thought for sure they had caught and kept everything in there! We decided to go diving this summer and guess what? So many bass still there! What I noticed is that the biggest ones we saw were on the south end of the pond in HEAVY vegetation. That side is not accessible on foot unless you had a boat but getting one to that pond is almost impossible. 

So, next experiment was to use live bait. The only forage in there are bluegill and hundreds of them. So we caught a few and tossed them out on dollar store balloons on our flipping sticks. Guess what? We immediately started slaying bass! The only thing I could conclude is that the huge amount of fishing pressure in such a small pond for such a long time made them stray away from artificial baits. I'll say the water is crystal clear and the maximum depth there during the rainy season is about 10 ft. You can easily see to the bottom in those depths. 

Now, that probably has nothing to do with your situation and I'm probably not right in my own either so take it for what it's worth. Just figured I would share and maybe get feedback from others as well. 

 

 

Pond bass will always eat a bluegill. I’ve even trained them to follow me around and wait on a bluegill 

 

@BrianMDTX, ain’t ya got a river to fish somewhere near by? Or a different pond? 

[BrianMDTX]

2 hours ago, TnRiver46 said:

Pond bass will always eat a bluegill. I’ve even trained them to follow me around and wait on a bluegill 

 

@BrianMDTX, ain’t ya got a river to fish somewhere near by? Or a different pond? 

I’ve tried a few other ponds but most are very shallow. I think I’m going to try Lake Raven in Huntsville. Lake Conroe is too big for my inflatable. 

[TnRiver46]

2 minutes ago, BrianMDTX said:

I’ve tried a few other ponds but most are very shallow. I think I’m going to try Lake Raven in Huntsville. Lake Conroe is too big for my inflatable. 

On those bigger reservoirs, I like to stand on a point or creek mouth and fan cast. Or stand on the bank and fish below the dam 

 

ours get drawn down in winter so you can walk around a great deal on the dry lake bed 

[the reel ess]

NM

[txchaser]

On 1/23/2022 at 9:32 AM, BrianMDTX said:

The last bass I caught that was a decent size was May 4th of last year (over 3.5 lbs.). The last one that was over 5 lbs. was on April 16th. Since then it’s been dinks and maybe a two-plus pound bass. But the last bass I caught was on November 20th. Since then I’ve had two soft strikes (missed the hook up) and that’s been it. I haven’t seen anyone else catch anything except cats. I haven’t seen any dead bass, but something has changed. I’ve been fishing this pond since 2020 and I was catching 3+ lb. bass regularly with some 4 and 5 lb’ers mixed in as well. Now it’s just dead. 
 

It’s not stream-fed (just replenished by rain), but the water level has been high since summer. It’s got me stumped. I know we had that week of super-low temps last year in February, but as the pond did not ice over I can’t see that really having an affect. It’s got to be something else. 

I've seen a similar thing on some smaller ponds down at the farm in central tx. 3-4lb common, 5 lb nice, 6.5lb occassionally... went to no big fish at all, nothing over 2.5 for sure. And these are places that only get fished once every 90 days. We culled sometimes, and that helped with weights for sure.

 

What changed:

1) the freeze - while they didn't ice over completely, it may have busted the ecosystem in some way

2) on one, the beavers showed up. they aren't eating the bass (pretty sure?) but they did build some spots and knock down some trees

3) I'm hearing people here and there complain about cormorants, which can shock it pretty hard. 

4) on one of the spots I used to always see a crowd of gills. Haven't seen them in a while. 

 

Anyway I've seen the same thing in four places now. I don't have any idea either. 

 

With all that said, there was another place up here in ntx that was great, and then one day it wasn't. Went from 100-0 very very fast. So bad the owner put a shock boat in it... and the fish were still there.

 

Have you tried creeping up on it like a deer hunter? I do wonder if on a lake that small, some significant part of the population has been sore-lipped enough they bail out when they hear you. I recall one of our members (paul) creeping on a pond on video, because that's what he had to do to get bit. 

 

[CrashVector]

Same issues here.

 

No bluegills...I can see fish, but none bite.

 

We get cormorants, but lots of anhingas too.  I accidentally hooked one under water on video while using a pit boss lol!  I thought I layed into a HUGE bass lol!

[hokiehunter373]

8 hours ago, txchaser said:

I've seen a similar thing on some smaller ponds down at the farm in central tx. 3-4lb common, 5 lb nice, 6.5lb occassionally... went to no big fish at all, nothing over 2.5 for sure. And these are places that only get fished once every 90 days. We culled sometimes, and that helped with weights for sure.

 

What changed:

1) the freeze - while they didn't ice over completely, it may have busted the ecosystem in some way

2) on one, the beavers showed up. they aren't eating the bass (pretty sure?) but they did build some spots and knock down some trees

3) I'm hearing people here and there complain about cormorants, which can shock it pretty hard. 

4) on one of the spots I used to always see a crowd of gills. Haven't seen them in a while. 

 

Anyway I've seen the same thing in four places now. I don't have any idea either. 

 

With all that said, there was another place up here in ntx that was great, and then one day it wasn't. Went from 100-0 very very fast. So bad the owner put a shock boat in it... and the fish were still there.

 

Have you tried creeping up on it like a deer hunter? I do wonder if on a lake that small, some significant part of the population has been sore-lipped enough they bail out when they hear you. I recall one of our members (paul) creeping on a pond on video, because that's what he had to do to get bit. 

 

There ya go, @BrianMDTX  get your stalking practice in during fishing season. You didn’t know the bass were trying to help out your deer skills now did ya? Lol. @txchasersounds like he’s on to something though. Although I do wonder about that freeze and all the places mentioned having similar results after it 

[N Florida Mike]

I’d try live bait regardless of the turtles, I once caught a big soft shell on a shiner and the next cast got a 7 pound bass.

My small lake has had similar issues to what you describe. In 2018 I got an 8.1 on a senko. In 2019, a 7.6 on a fluke. In 2020 I had a stellar numbers year, but nothing over 5. 2021 was the worst year for numbers in years and nothing over 5 again. Less fish 4-5.

The fishing is still fair but not what I’m used to. I have looked at it from all angles and just can’t figure it out.

Maybe I’m just in a slump,

Maybe I should go back to live bait myself just to see…?