I've been thinking about a way to avoid having hook shy fish in stocked ponds. I don't have any business doing this because I've never stocked fish or managed a pond, but ignorance never stopped me before.

To start with I'm assuming that fish get hook shy because they've been caught before and it sucked for them, so they become more cautious about food on a string. There may be other reasons, but that's what I'm focusing on at the moment.

I'm thinking in terms of stocking a new pond. If it works in new ponds, maybe it would work in an established pond too.

1. When it's time to stock the top predator fish add a relatively small number of tagged fish. This number should take into consideration losses from predation, etc.

2. Practice catch and release strictly with the tagged fish. The goal is for these fish to die of old age.

3. Never release the offspring of the original fish, regardless of size. If you get hooked once, you're out of the game.

That's basically it. You get a handful of wise, old, hook shy breeding stock, and their offspring never get a chance to learn angler avoidance.

Has anyone tried this?

Sounds great. Your well thought out method should work. The only question I have is, do the tags have numbers? You could have 2-3 tagged fish that are idiots, and keep getting caught over and over. That could be misleading.

I can catch bluegills for awhile and then nothing bites. However, if I toss in some feed, they go after it. I don't think only catch and release is a problem. Those sucker learn that there is a string attached to my offerings and just quit biting.

bobad, I wouldn't mind if the original fish were caught repeatedly as long as they were always released. Their role is to provide a consistent source of new fish only. They represent a guarantee that you won't wipe out the fish population because of excessive harvesting.

This "hook shy" topic is interesting. Another thread talked about frequency of fishing in a smaller pond. I have no clue about this because currently my pond doesn't get that much fishing pressure and so the fishing is almost always fairly good.

What I wonder about is varying tackle a lot. Because of a short attention span I am constantly varying tackle. Sure if a lure is really hot one day I'll fish the lure but once it starts to slow down I'll change up. Throw something completely different. I wonder if constantly varying tackle (lures and line) could lessen the "hook shy" problem. Don't know just speculating.

Another thing that I do is talk to the fish when I'm fishing. "Hey Mister Bass, look at me innocent little fry swimming in the shallows, oh, and I'm wounded, can't swim very fast, probably be an easy meal for a studly bass like yourself." If that strategy doesn't work I go for the taunt... "Hey Bass, what are you a Girlyman, think you can take this swimming lizard out, you want a piece of me, I'll bet you can't even swallow a lizard as big as me, go back to your momma and tell her you're hungry, and they call YOU a predator?"

Kinda drives my wife crazy but it works. I didn't do this when DIED was teaching me to fly fish. I figured he was questioning my mental stability enough as it was and why push my luck.

I think in some species & instances, learning hook shyness can be indirect. I.E. "My brother tried to eat one of those things, and bad stiff happened to him."

Theo, do you mean that unconditioned fish (not shy) observe hook shy fish and then mimic that behavior? That's consistent with my idea of how nature operates. If that's the case the hook shy fish that "taught" the other fish most likely were caught and released at some point. That wouldn't happen often with this management strategy because of the small initial stocking of breeders. I'm picturing stocking maybe 1/10 of the recommended number of your target species. I know this would lengthen the amount of time it takes to bring up the population, but it might be worth it.

Does that address your thoughts at all?

Great idea, that would work in some situations.

In my small ponds here's how I deal with it.

When I fish, I always, always use the same bait. It makes it challenging for me, and I think it keeps me from wearing out the biggest best fish by catching them repeatedly.

When a guest fishes, they get to use a different bait, and their catch rates are always high, because guests only fish my ponds about twenty hours a year. This way, they get maximum enjoyment, and they think they are much better fishermen than I am, and they have a good shot at the occasional super trophy like an 11 inch bluegill.

You're a kind man "Big Gills" Condello.

Here's little more detail about my theory: Instead of buying hundreds/thousands of fingelings (your choice of target species), spend that same amount on on a handful of large adults. Better yet you could collect them yourself since you aren't looking for hundreds or thousands of fish.

I think another way to avoid this is using live bait that is also given out as freebies. I fish off the dock with worms and crickets but also throw even more to these out with no strings attached. Maybe one out of ten crickets may have a hook in it so the fish are conditioned to think people=food. You spend a lot of time catching bait to offer as a free meal but having the fish swarm to you is worth it. I enjoy feeding as much as fishing.

the magnanimous dr. condello.....seriously, that's really funny, and a nice way to be bruce....the ultimate in hospitality..LOL

DD1, if you havent tried this already....when yer BG get hookshy, take a small (1/16 oz) BG jig (i like chartreuse w/ gold hook - crimped barb), put a chunk of worm on hook, douse w/ a little anise or fish oil, they will come back for seconds, thirds, fourths....etc. i always reward w/ a handful of feed just before leaving the spot.

jeff...didnt mean to cramp yer style .....please dont hold back when i'm around, i promise i wont tell anyone.

DJT....its called chumming...

GW, with feed trained fish, turn off the feeders for a few days.
I have found that competition and hunger overcomes "hook-shyness"...

Bruce, I have used used the same trick and let my special occasion "guest" out fish me...
That's my story and I'm stickin' to it...

I doubt that I will.

That's pretty much what I was getting at - they see other fish getting caught, maybe on bait THEY came in 2nd place on, and develop a negative association with it.

I tell myself that's "compensatory feeding", george.

Theo, I think we're barking up different trees. I think you're saying that one "virgin" fish sees another "virgin" fish take bait and get caught causing shyness in the witnessing fish.

I'm saying that the first fish has been caught 2 or 3 times in it's life and has gradually become shy. Then the spectator fish sees the hook shy fish avoiding the bait and copies that cautious behavior.

Guys some fish species give off a stress chemical when stressed like being hooked and dragged through the water.Other fish pick up on the warning. This result is much worse if you catch and release as the response continues for a longer period. That is why some fisherman put the fish in the live well until they are finished with an area. Then they release them all. BG can exhibit the same catchabitlty traits as LMB.

Thanks ewest, do you have an opinion about how that effects my management theory?

Thanks D.I.E.D.; I'll give it a try.

Actually, if I catch 10 to 12 BG on nightcrawlers, crickets, black gnats, pellet flies or whatever, everything stops. If I catch a catfish on anything, they won't come to feed for days.

These aren't previously caught fish. It's just that they learn quickly about easy meals with strings attached.

Fortunately my fish are kinda stupid.

DD1, I don't doubt for a second what you're saying, but I don't understand it either.

GW, it's kinda like fish in a public lake. When a new lake is opened to the public, you can catch fish anywhere. After awhile, they become conditioned to fishing and become very wary.

It's easy for me to understand a fish getting shy after being caught once or twice, or maybe several times on different tackle. What I'm not getting is how a virgin fish can learn shyness without being hooked itself.

The other scenario I mentioned before is where a virgin fish sees the hook shy fish from the paragraph above and adopts the same wariness. For that type situation you need a fish that has become hook shy through direct experience.

I imagine this can't go beyond educated guessing.

That's basically what I do in my small pond that is stocked with the GG's. The nice thing about the GG's is they are the least likely fish to get conditioned that I have seen in ponds....maybe aggressivenes is the positive way of saying it. For the LMB predator in that TGG pond, the original LMB stockers were fin clipped and will always be returned when caught and all other LMB will always removed. All Fx offspring are removed and none of the original GG's are removed.

In my larger ponds, fishing pressure is the key to fish conditioning. Since I choose to fish most every day, I have to be very careful about managing fishing pressure. My approach is to rotate among ponds and locations within the ponds. Unless fishing with guests, my fishing is always done in low light conditions and for short periods of time....e.g. the last couple of hours of daylight or first hour of sunrise.

Multiple ponds allow you to minimize the effects of fishing pressure and conditioning. It works for me and the proof is that I'm enjoying fantastic fishing this spring like I have never before seen or experienced in ponds.

Some of you guys who go back a ways on the Forum will remember a discussion thread I started on multiple small ponds vs one larger pond. It was my belief back then that multiple small ponds would facilitate minimizing fish conditioning...this has indeed been the case for me. Three ponds of 3 acres can be far superior to one pond of 9 or 10 acres, from a fish conditioning standpoint. In addition, I see no sacrifice of top end size in fish from multiple smaller ponds vs single large ones.

A fish does not have to be caught to be conditioned. Everything I see in fishing points to this. A bonefish on a shallow saltwater flat that observes his budddies being caught on a funny looking fly becomes just as conditioned as a LMB that observes the same event in a pond.

However, the mechanism for conditioning fish that only "observe" other fish being caught is not at all certain, to me. Whether it is indeed observed behavior or some other form of communication, its clear to me that a fish can be conditioned without being caught. Fortunately, there are management approaches which can minimize those effects.

Thanks ML.

I've seen fish become skittish many times. You catch 1 or 2, and the rest are on high alert the rest of the day. May as well move on to another spot!

When bream are on the beds and acting broody and aggressive, they don't seem to care that they are getting picked off 1 by 1. When they are simply foraging around the banks, it's an entirely different matter.

I think it arises from the genetic traits in all fish. The genetic traits are hard wired for control/prominence differently at different times. One of those is the stress indicator chemical noted above . At different times , reproduction comes first , at other times feeding , the flight (safety) response at other times, aggressiveness , caution , and on. When conditions are right for feeding (low stress) and all of the sudden one fish is hooked ,dragged around , lifted out of the water and put back in ,during that process it releases a stress indicator (warning signal) the others pick up on. They react when the signal is strong enough and it overrides the feeding signal and they stop feeding for a while. Same for spawning priority overriding the stress chemical during the BG spawn. Spawning ranks higher at that time and you can catch a bunch off the beds. But if you let them see you then the flight response is greater and they will move off the nests for protection. Because of genetic variation between different species and between different individual fish in a population of one specie you get different levels of traits and thus different results.

This also includes "dumb" fish vs. "smart" fish. Over time the dumb ones have a tendency to get harvested at higher rates leaving the smarter fish in the gene pool to reproduce.

Good point Shorty !! Also note that those just happen to be the most aggressive fish at the time also. That was also noted in the TPW 16 yr. LMB study (no angling) but many of the aggressive fish early ended up as meals for larger fish.

I observe this every year in Northern Michigan - hook shy on the big public lakes, ravenous on small back woods ponds.

Somehow, I find myself singing that old song "I Like 'Em Big and Stupid".

Maybe genetic traits (dumb fish/smart fish) are a factor, but I doubt that they're a major one.

The way I see it nature only rewards the "smart" fish to a point. A fish that is genetically, or even environmentally oriented to be overly cautious will not grow as big, or reproduce as much. I would also think that a hungry fish is "dumber" than a well fed fish.

I wonder if "smartness" comes into play more with the angler instead of the fish. There have been several suggestions already in this thread that indicate ways to keep catching pond fish. Maybe human actions other than the bait presented are more important. If you take away a fishes conditioning and genetic traits, you still have an animal that is in an "eat or be eaten" situation. The fish that are inclined to be reckless are probably what we refer to as forage. The fish that survive to decent size are all going to be wary to a large degree.

The fish in Mr. H's big pond, where I'm collecting WM, have apparently gotten less hook shy since I read this thread. Normally when I fish there I get a good number of strikes at first and land one or two fish. My habit was to assume that I'd found some good structure, or that the conditions had brought the fish to that spot. I'd keep fishing in that area of the pond, but typically the action would slow down. Dang hook shy fish!

After reading some posts above I went to the pond yesterday evening and started out with a few fish hitting right away. After landing them I walked down the bank about 100 feet and tried again and caught more fish. Then, every time I caught a fish I would move from that part of the pond. Miraculously my behavior must have hypnotized the fish into losing their "hook shyness".

GW, Ewest brought a paper to a meeting showing that only 1/2 of LMB ever bite a hook. Obviously a 10 lb. one finally makes a mistake. The interesting thing was that the hook shy ones offspring also were hook shy. And, their offspring were hook shy. As I recall, it was a University study. It does appear to be a major factor.

Heck, I've often thought that fish were smarter than me.

On those wm you should try superworms from petco. about $4 gets you lie 50 and no fish can resist them. I have been catching sunfish and bass on them so I know wm will like'm.

GW,

Way to go!! Now you are fishing, instead of just catching

Sometimes I prefer to use the term "selective" instead of "smart". A fish's intelligence is probably a measure of many of factors than just it's tendency to be selective.

I agree that a fish could be selective to a fault. At some point, that moments hesitation means you don't get fed.

The ultimate pond would be to have it full of fish with ample forage, but the tendency to be less selective. I'm working on that right now, without a lot of success. The one exception is my bluegill that I'm selecting for rapid growth. They're not particularly selective right now, even when they're full. That's good......I think.

GW take a look at this thread. It has the info DD1 was talking about.

http://www.pondboss.com/cgi-bin/ubbcgi/ultimatebb.cgi?ubb=get_topic;f=20;t=001994;p=1

George posted a thread a few weeks ago that no one seemed interested in but me. It looked to me like TPW was starting to crawfish on some of the prior info they developed on this subject. Strange to me but it looked like other motives were involved . I think the first info (thread above) which refers to peer reviewed studies is sound. Go figure.