# too many crappie - HELP



## abrown (Mar 4, 2008)

Just joined the site love the information so far. I'm hoping someone here can help. I have a about 100 feet of bank on a subdivision lake. Its only about an acre and a half and all of the owners are trying to get together and take care of it. The lake is an original farm pond (prior to development), at least 40 years old. All the fish we catch are healthy, just undersized. All of us fish and are concerned about a few things. 

1. We have a large number of White Crappie in the lake. They seem healthy but they are undersized. Very rarely we pull one out about 9-10 inches, but even those are underweight. Looking for way to increase size. I have heard they don't do well in ponds and we may just be better off to started fertilizing the yard with them, but I hope someone has a few ideas. 

2. Someone in the past put several grass carp in the lake. Best guess is that there are 10 to 12 in it at least 3 feet long. the last one I pulled out of was 42 inches long and 39 lbs. We are concerned about the apparant lack of vegetation in the lack and are probably going to remove most of them. Any thoughts.

3. Large number of LARGE Snapping turtles. I've pulled out 6 - 25+ pound snapping turtles and you can still watch the baby ducks disappear every spring.

Other info: good population of cats some 20+ lbs, blugill/bream are plentiful but smallish, bass seem to top out at 11 inches and 2 lbs, apparrant lack of vegetation and vissible minnow schools is a concern. 

Any input would be helpful.

Thanks


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## Flathead King 06 (Feb 26, 2006)

are you speaking of sylvian shores lake in clark county


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## ErieAngler (Apr 15, 2006)

I'll take care of you snapping turtle problem


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## Snakecharmer (Apr 9, 2008)

The grass carp or amur were probably put in to control weeds. Sounds like they did there job. They're not the easiest to catch so you may have to revert to bow-fishing. If weeds take over the lake 1 or 2 should be enough to maintain control.
The snappers got to go. Not only are ducklings disapearing but they are probably eating alot of your fish. Too bad you can't train them to eat the crappie only...


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## Net (Apr 10, 2004)

Your pond is out of balance due to a lack of vegetation. Minnows need grasses for reproduction and protection. Crappies prefer dense woody structure like xmas trees or a man made device in the deepest part of the pond. Hope this helps.



> apparrant lack of vegetation and vissible minnow schools is a concern


Just as you suspected...


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## ErieAngler (Apr 15, 2006)

Sounds like you need to read up on pond management. From my experience, if you don't harvest a healthy amount of fish per year, you will end up in your situation. Its good to employ your own "slot management" system. The best ponds I ever fished, were ones that allowed controlled harvest by the owners. Basically they would keep a eye on who fished them and what they took and specified what they were permitted to take. Usually it was bluegill and undersized bass and crappie. 

You can buy fish feeders to help with the food shortage problem, they work wonders for increasing the average annual rate of growth and everything from catfish to gills benefit from them.


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## [email protected] (Jun 13, 2004)

No expert here but it sounds like the lake is over populated. We have a lot of stone quarries over here, some decent bass, a few crappie, millions of gills but not very many bigger than the size of my middle finger.


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## Net (Apr 10, 2004)

Adding an automatic fish feeder or reducing the number of stunted fish is just treating the symptoms of an unhealthy pond. The ODNR website has publications available if you're serious about restoring the health of your pond.


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## [email protected] (Dec 22, 2006)

It sounds like you have a good catfish lake. The hardest part may be getting everyone to agree on the goals of the pond. Increasing vegetation may benefit the fish but may not make some of the other owners happy. 

It sounds like the crappie are causing problems for both the bluegill and bass. Removing as many crappie as possible will likely result in improvements for all the species. As others have stated, a slot size limit on the bass may help them acheive larger sizes too. Feeding will help the bluegills and catfish directly and the crappie and bass mostly through added forage production. The catfish will likely eat more than their share of pellets though which could be good or bad.


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## abrown (Mar 4, 2008)

Thanks for the suggestions. 

We have a good consensus among the owners about what we want. (Typical blugill, bass, catfish in good balance.) Just trying to make sure we do it right. 

Sounds like the crappie gotta go (okay, realistically, thinned out). 

Sounds like most of the carp gotta go as well. 

Feeder sounds like a good idea.

Other than thinning out the carp, any ideas for adding/increasing the right vegetation? 

Forgot to mention we do have a good quantity of cat-tails around the lake, just not much else is evident. 


Thanks again


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## [email protected] (Dec 22, 2006)

Is your water very clear? Do the surrounding people want the cattails? How much of the shoreline is surrounded and to what depth? 

Cattails can suck up a lot of nutrients. I observed an electofishing survey several years ago of a 1 acre pond that was completely surrounded with a band of cattails probably 20' to 30' wide. The water was so clear you could see to over 5' deep. The fish shocked up were small skinny bass a few large healthy looking channel cats and some various bluegill, green sunfish, pumpkinseeds and their various hybrids. It was determined that the infestation of cattails was reducing the fertility so much that the fry had little to nothing to eat and the clear water made predation on those few forage fish being produced very easy for those hungry largemouth. The forage base had been depleted to the point that the various sunfish were interbreeding with other species due to the lack of partners of their own kind. Low fertility=low production=skinny small fish.


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## Net (Apr 10, 2004)

[email protected] said:


> Cattails can suck up a lot of nutrients. I observed an electofishing survey several years ago of a 1 acre pond that was completely surrounded with a band of cattails probably 20' to 30' wide. The water was so clear you could see to over 5' deep. The fish shocked up were small skinny bass a few large healthy looking channel cats and some various bluegill, green sunfish, pumpkinseeds and their various hybrids. It was determined that the infestation of cattails was reducing the fertility so much that the fry had little to nothing to eat and the clear water made predation on those few forage fish being produced very easy for those hungry largemouth. The forage base had been depleted to the point that the various sunfish were interbreeding with other species due to the lack of partners of their own kind. Low fertility=low production=skinny small fish.


[email protected],

Partly because I was skeptical of your answer but mostly because I was bored silly at work today, I forwarded your response to the staff at Stone Lab for critical analysis. Heres their response. With a few exceptions, I must admit you do seem to be in the ballpark . My apologies for ambushing you without first giving you the opportunity to provide more info .

http://ohioseagrant.osu.edu/discuss/index.php?topic=1135.0

fwiw, this part of the Stone Lab response appears to support my initial claim that grasses & woody cover are of primary concern.

_Without more data, I'd be more likely to believe they resulted more from a lack of in-pond cover, either in the form of submerged macrophytes or even turbidity. Too many seasons without cover for young-of-year prey can leave predators to too easily crop forage fish populations to a depauperate state._


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## Mushijobah (May 4, 2004)

I'll come help with the crappie...

ok, i abuse that joke too oftern.

Have any pictures of the pond and/or the fish caught out of it?


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## hang_loose (Apr 2, 2008)

[email protected], Could you put that response (from Nets reply) into something we could understand?

We got lost in there


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## [email protected] (Dec 22, 2006)

I gave the story to help understand my questions.

My initial questions: Is your water very clear? Do the surrounding people want the cattails? How much of the shoreline is surrounded and to what depth? and these questions were not given to the other person which would have helped the other guy understand where I was going with this...just trying to eliminate one possible problem and get an idea of turbity, fertility or lack thereof.


Starting with the water seemed like a logical starting point and the mention of cattails was suspect based on previous experience. I didn't disregard turbity, I directly asked how clear the water is to which we still haven't answered. The responder is also questioning how much submerged vegetation which was already established that there is a suspected "lack of vegetation" possibly due to grass carp.


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## Eugene (Jun 23, 2004)

Just to be clear, sounds reasonable to me...on both forums.


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## Eugene (Jun 23, 2004)

PS: The answer "we could understand" is supposed to be the Sea Grant post's bottom line:


> So, could this situation be affected by excessive cattails? Maybe, but even if so, I wouldn't want to credit direct competition of cattails with the fish food web without more data. It may be more an indirect effect of cattails in competition with other vegetation leading to a lack of cover for forage fish. ...But I couldn't really pick which scenario I'd favor without more data...and maybe not even then.


Sorry if I didn't quite hit it.


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## Net (Apr 10, 2004)

Hey thanks Eugene. I had no idea you were already a contributing member over here. So much for my incognito post on the sea grant site :ghost:


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## [email protected] (Dec 22, 2006)

I guess I'm gonna have to try harder to produce some results on Eugene's BS O-meter


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## Net (Apr 10, 2004)

hahaha what can I say...we might've got an actual reading if not for that pesky "more data needed" requirement . No hard feelings, I hope.


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## rogue (Feb 27, 2009)

Sounds like your getting pointed in the rite direction . some inexpensive things you can do is setting some limb lines or jugs for the turtles it works and it's fun . The one guy that said about the christmas trees I think is rite ( not that anybody was wrong ) .We take 4 or 5 trees and a concrete block and tie them together with aluminum wire and set them out on some good ice in deeper water . 3 to 4 sets of trees per acre should due fine .You can get the wire at most hardware stores . You can contact odnr and water & soil conservation they some times have funding programs that will help . Like the one guy said keep an eye on your bait fish population , make a lot of habitat , and cut down on the turtles and crappies and big cats and things should turn around for your place in a couple of years . It's a labor of love and fun for you and generations to come.


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## [email protected] (Dec 22, 2006)

No hard feelings Net. Making a good decision using a bunch of information collected only works if the information is good. Like my boss always says "garbage in, garbage out"


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## katfish (Apr 7, 2004)

The very simplest solution to decrease crappie or panfish populations is to drop in a few saugeye. They don't reproduce but are very aggressive feeders of fry and small minnows.

As others have mentioned, pond management will depend on a combination of several factors all being maximized at the same time.

The fella that sells Georgia Giant bluegills also markets several lights that knock bugs into the water for fish feed. This would help reduce insect populations around your homes and produce a rewewable cheap feed for the fish.

Feeder

Also I plan on purchasing a solar powered bug zapper I saw at Harbour Freight and plan to hang it over a pond with the bottom off to see if it will effectively feed fish or not.

He also sells floating turtle traps and does pond consulting.

If there are lots of big catfish the pond must be fertile and providing adequate feed.

Often smaller waters just cannot support crappie to a large size.


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## [email protected] (Dec 22, 2006)

Abrown already has either too many bass or not enough forage. I'm pretty sure adding more predators (saugeye) will not solve either the predator overabundance or lack of forage problems in the timeframe Abrown is hoping for. Saugeye will not outperform bass as a predator in a pond like Abrown's. 

The bug wacker feeder looks like it would be good entertainment but I doubt it would add a significant amount to the food chain. Much better than just zapping the bugs and letting them go to waste though. You'd probably want to place such a device where a heron wouldn't exploit having all your fish waiting around for an easy meal.


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## tight line 75 (Mar 11, 2009)

It is true that crappie usually dont do well in lakes like this. THe bluegill will outcompete them when feeding on invertabrates, and the bass will outcompete them for baitfish. it actually seems like their may be to much vegatation in your lake. It may not be visable of course but, there is no reason your bass should be that size with the amount of avaible food. i would take the turtles out along with any common carp. If your talking about lake sylvian i actually sampled this lake in the fall with the ohio state universty. after reviewing the data i came up with some good ideas, we should talk more.


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## wildman (Sep 3, 2008)

I will put my 2 cents in.

If it were my lake to remedy the problems.

1. I would spray aqua pro on the cattails keep some if you want some for the pond look. 

2. I would jug the turtles out as it was stated it can be fun. Us something that stays on the hook.

3. If it is in your budget then I would get a feeder use it for a year or two. The crappie will get healthy. Catch them and eat them they are one or the best to eat. Don't be scared to keep some of blue gills. They reproduce fairly quick. Even keep a catfish or two.

4. I would implicate a slot limit on the fish. I would utilizes this to bring the #'s back to check. Have a fish fry for the neighborhood or friends

5. Put in Flathead minnows and put in some structure. 

6. you only need a couple of grass carp in a lake that size. keep in mind that when grass carp get that big they slow there eating down they don't eat more.


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## Salmonid (Apr 14, 2004)

In my new pond, I pellet fed all last summer and fall and never saw a crappie come to the feeding, seems from a lot or research, they dont take well to pellets when minnies are around. My perch showed up all the time at the feeding BTW. 
I agree, get rid of the turtles, an older pond usually has way too many of them with no predators. 
Salmonid


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## I Fish (Sep 24, 2008)

Looks like a lot of good ideas. I would just add to check the bass and make sure they are northern strain, and not spotted bass. This gets overlooked, because people seem to think a bass is a LM or SM, and forget about Spotted. Our ponds have somehow aquired(they were not stocked) a spotted bass population, and they seem to breed like rabbits, and don't get much over 2lbs. The easiest way to check them is rub their tongue, and if there is a rough patch, they are spots, and you might want to sample a few, as there probably are still some northern strain left. I don't know if they will cross breed. I've been keeping every spot from the ponds I catch(bleed them like a walleye, and they taste pretty good). Our top bass went from averaging about 6+lbs down to about 4 as a result of the increased competition for food, I suspect. I am slowly getting ahead of them, as last year the catch ratio was 4 spots per one northern, and this year it's been about 2 to 1, but I don't know if I'll ever get them completely irradicated, but I'm trying.


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## Carpn (Apr 5, 2004)

If you are in SW Ohio I can try and help you remove some grass carp...Won't be able to get em all but will get as many as possible...I also have a buddy who turtle traps and can get the turtles out of there....Good luck


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