I've found some very general and nebulous documents on the Internet pertaining to farming GS. I'd like to do it on a small scale, enough to really 'feed' my pond. If anyone has any pointers, demensions on a pond, etc., please educate me.

Here are 2 companion SARC Fact Sheets which give the basics on GShiners (and other forage species).

Forage Species

Range, Description and Life History


http://srac.tamu.edu/tmppdfs/381285-140f...a523faf141f6512


Forage Species

Production Techniques

http://srac.tamu.edu/tmppdfs/381285-141f...a523faf141f6512

Two from U of Fla. via AquaNic.

http://edis.ifas.ufl.edu/FA038 Golden Shiner Culture: A Reference Profile

http://edis.ifas.ufl.edu/BODY_FA040 Economic Considerations of Golden Shiner Production in Florida

AquaNic bait fish home page http://aquanic.org/beginer/baitfish/baitfish.htm

Last semester I took aquaculture and we got to tour some fish farms.

For golden shiners, these mats were placed in 1-2 feet of water. Golden Shiners attach their eggs to vegetation. If you dont have very much vegetation these may help you increase the amount of eggs that hatch.

Chris,

Do you know what the material is inside the fencing? It looks like a plastic filter of some kind. I assume one would wait for the spawn and then transfer the mats from the brood pond to a pond for the fingerlings.

Thanks in advance.

Any long nap internal rug or artificial turf or door mat material would work. One can buy various filter mat materials from places like Aquatic Ecosystems but this would be more expensive than using used carpet or remnants. Contact carpet installers for scrap pieces of carpet. Offer them a few token dollars so they keep you in mind for buying their scraps. Shag carpet would be a good example, but any mats left in the pond a long time without rinsing will likely load up with algae and detritus. Place mats in spawning pond for only a short time before removing to rinse fairly frequently (every 2-4days) to keep the material relatively clean so any laid adhesive eggs will stick to the "fibers". If your timing is right, mats will contain eggs for transfer after 12-24hrs.

Spawntex fiber
http://www.aquaticeco.com/index.cfm/fuseaction/product.detail/iid/3365/cid/1204

Spanish moss put in a frame has been used as has nylon brush material. If you use carpet clean off any solvents etc prior to use.

Ewest if I were to buy this material to try and increase the number of GS in my pond when would I put it in? I think you said the GS only spawns once a year.

On that second catfish photo I think the head/body ratio is awfully small for a bullhead. I'm not familiar with a lot of the various smaller catfish species so I could be all wet, but our bullies have bigger heads.

Is the first picture a golden a shiner and the other pictures a bullhead? These were in the creek that feeds my pond.

The tail of the catfish is round and not forked like a channel catfish. Could it be a flathead?

It doesn't have the morphology or markings of a flathead. Are you aware of any other species in your area? I looked on the internet for photos of other similar, smaller cats but couldn't find any.

Aye-firmative on the GSH, James.

That really looks bad!!!Yuck!!! But you are the eye of the beholder.

I'm not saying that I'm sure it's not a bullhead. It's just that I'm used to seeing older bullies with what looks like broader bigger heads.

The only catfish I stocked were channel catfish but the area lakes have flatheads, blues and channel catfish. These little catfish are very numerous in the creek that supplies my pond and so I naturally wanted to know what they were. This wouldn't be the first time that fish have shown up in my pond that I didn't stock. This spring I discovered I had large numbers of threadfin shad that weren't stocked. I also caught a lot of baby bass in the creek with my net. It was interesting to see how different the baby bass were. I assumed all of the bass were from this years spawn but the lighter colored bass were almost twice the size of the darker ones. I wish I had taken pictures of the bass so you could help identify them as well. Next week I will try to post pictures of the bass.

Here's a bullhead in the more familiar shape.

See how the tail is rounded.

GShiners - SARC

Spawning begins when
water temperatures reach 70° F and
continues through June. The females
lay up to 10,000 eggs in vegetated
areas. Young hatch in 4 to 8 days
and like adults, feed on plant and animal life.