# Spring Stocking Help?



## SmittyN330 (May 17, 2013)

Hey everyone. My father has recently acquired a pond that was adjacent to his property, and he plans on stocking it in the spring. I am going to help decide the fish that will be stocked. Something very cool about the pond is that it is about an acre in area, but it is uncharacteristically deep, about 25-35 feet, to be exact. The water is relatively clear and there is some, but not a whole lot of, algae and plant growth. Currently, the pond contains bluegill, largemouth, crappie, and channel cats. The pond used to be stocked with trout by one of its previous owners, and with great success. As of now, we plan on stocking catchable rainbows around March, probably at least 8" long each. There is also a bit of a bluegill problem. We plan on also stocking some hybrid stripers, not only to control the bluegill overpopulation, but also to provide their incredible sport fishing. My questions are:
1. Are these good species for the pond?
2. Any other species you could recommend?
3. What size should the fish be? We would like them to be catchable upon stocking.
4. How many of each species should we get?

Thanks.


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## chris311 (Oct 24, 2010)

i can controll your bluegill population for free on or off the ice 

Sent from my SGH-T679 using Ohub Campfire mobile app


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## [email protected] (Dec 22, 2006)

Greater than 6 feet of depth really makes no difference on the number of fish that can be stocked. A ponds ability to support life is a factor of surface acres not volume of water.


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## Mr. A (Apr 23, 2012)

The first thing I would do in your shoes is make sure there isn't an imbalance in the system. For instance, are the bass long and skinny or relatively small? Basically are they stunted? How about bluegill, are they all large or most all the same size? Same with the channel cats? If the fish are stunted you need to either stock fish that can shake things up and even out the balance or harvest some of any fish in great numbers. I would suggest harvesting all species according to what % of the population they make up.

If everything looks like it should I would find someone with a good fish finder and map the bottom out for yourself, so you know if there is enough structure and the right types of structure for what you want.

The hybrids will eat the trout in short order, then start on the gills and any other fry you put in there. If you stock them I would stock them last and not too many of them.

If the bass are stunted, I would suggest stocking larger bass since they'll be ready to fish after introduction, plus they shake up the food chain enough that the gill problem will work itself out eventually. Sooner if you help them out.

Also, I would look into stocking a few pounds of minnows a couple times a year to help even things out for the smaller bass. Could probably stop after the population equals out.

Just my 2c. Hope it helps....

Mr. A


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## SmittyN330 (May 17, 2013)

Thanks everyone, never thought about he hybrids eating the trout... Um, will the largemouth eat the trout?


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## [email protected] (Dec 22, 2006)

Largemouth love to eat trout and will have a much greater impact than hybrid stripers. Largemouth have no trouble eating a trout half their length. Lakes in California stocked with trout produce some the biggest largemouth in the US. Trout have an apparent ideal balance of nutrition for bass and are easy going down. Aquamax Largemouth feed was actually created to provide as close to a trout as possible in pellet form. 

Hybrids are generally not very effective at controlling bluegill where a significant amount of weeds are present...they're built for open water feeding. Their mouths are relatively small too. Largemouths on the other hand are made for feeding in the shallow jungles where the bluegill tend to hang out and readily eat bluegills 1/3 their length.

Clear ponds are generally not very fertile and therefore simply can't support very many pounds of fish. Removing fish is oftentimes a more effective option at increasing size...and a lot cheaper than stocking minnows. 10 pounds of minnows grows 1 pound of bass. At $10/lb for minnows....$100 for a 1lb gain isn't very cost effective.

If those minnows get eaten by bluegills or crappie then the bass eat the bluegill or crappie...it will take 100 lbs of minnows to add 1 lb of bass (via the bluegill or crappie) you're now spending $1000/lb of gain. Stocking forage fish is the best option to grow big fish but it takes pretty deep pockets to make a significant impact and maintain it long term.

Pellet feeding is a much more cost effective option where $2 or $3 of feed will grow a pound of bluegill, hybrid and even bass if you can get them to eat pellets. Think about it...the fish farm is growing minnows off of feed...paying someone to feed them, load them into an expensive truck, fuel to haul them, etc. Why not cut out the middle men and buy a feeder and feed. The feed also increases the fertility through the waste which may be a good thing.


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## rustyfish (Apr 27, 2004)

I would not worry about too many your 8"+ rainbows getting eaten.

As [email protected] said feeding that pond would be good for multiple reasons.
- Trout and gills will do really well on food
- Waste from food will help fertilize if it is clear (infertile) 
- As [email protected] said depth does not exactly increase amount of fish supported, but it does create a larger buffer for water quality so chance of over feed/fertilizing is much less.
- Micro and Macroinverts are a big source of food for the same fish that will eat fish food. A pond that deep is going to have less area suitable for them to live in. Could be one problem your gills are facing, and feeding will help.

This is always a guess but ponds tend to produce a good percentage of what they can support. So before I would stock anything new into an already stocked pond I would remove fish. Skinny bass would be a good place to start, if it looks skinny then it has most likely lost growth potential anyways. Fish do grow their entire lives but every year the percentage gain goes down. That is why a lot of trophy fish turn out much younger than people would expect. Missing or slowing years of growth lowers its potential. This is why a stunted population of fish is so hard to fix even if you can mange to fix the cause.


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