Bruce , CB1 ,Bill and others :

Guys could the forum members get an update on the status of the " Grand Experiment " otherwise known as the male only BG ponds? Have been watching {reading posts} with great interest and thought you might be seeing a trend or interesting observation. While it has been hot we are seeing falling over night low temps. { from 74+- to 66+- } and lower high temps. and wondered if you have incountered the same and if it has increased activity of exper. ponds over regular ponds as to BG { feeding or pre-winter activity}. ewest

Ewest,

I don't have much to report. Unfortunately I don't have any hard data either as I have stock from two sources of various sizes in the pond, and I did not mark and measure any of the fish when planting. I've caught and released some in the 7 1/2 to 8 inch range and most of the fish I got this spring topped out at 7 inches. (measured at the hatchery when I picked them up).

I have somewhere over 400 in this little 1/10th acre pond, and I do lose one now and then which seems to go in spurts. One floating one day, then the next, then no morts for a week or two or a month. Fish feed well at noon and just before dark. For some reason in the morning they are not active although I'm sure i could train them for morning feeding if I wanted to. My trout are the same way for some reason. Any grasshopper or other insect that lands on the water is toast!

I have fry around the edges of the pond (not all males!)and I'm concerned if they are getting enough to eat as I used a dye initially which probably suppressed zooplankton. I purchased a floating powder feed to feed them but it's hard to tell if they eat it. I ordered the next size up that sinks and will see what happens with that. At some point I may drain the pond and sort -- this fall or next spring.

Temps are cooling off but it's still warm for September. Highs in the low 80's and lows in the 50's. I'm sure we will get a sudden weather change at some point and go into shock!

My two all male BG ponds (1+ acre and .1 acre) are both behaving similarly. They are having increased feeding activity but really spotty on angling success. When I do catch a BG he will typically have a Wr of 110 to 130. Maybe this is why they're hard to catch. They're beautiful. All of them are no longer in spawning regalia, but they look so cool when they develop shoulders. I've been catching mostly 8-9 inchers that weigh 3/4 of a pound. I've added a few fish here and there. The larger pond has 557 BG right now. You'd think that you would foul hook one even if they weren't biting, but I guess it doesn't work that way. I keep expecting a time this fall when fishing improves, but the combination of ample pellets, millions of water boatmen and limited competition may keep the CPUE down until next spring.

My water temps are in the 76-78 degree range. Daytime highs are mid to upper-80's.

By the way, my bluegill won't eat in the morning either, just like Cecil's! They are impossible to catch until noon or later and the evening feeding is the big one. Why in the world would that be?

Bruce, do you monitor daily DO?

We've adopted the strategy of a twice-a-day feeding schedule in summer: around noon, then evening. Evening feeding is always bigger, but so is DO.

You're absolutely right about my DO dropping off quite a bit overnight. That's always been a guess of mine, in regards to bluegill feeding, but why would my HSB feed so well in the a.m.?

I was thinking D.O. would be it too and embarrassingly I haven't been checking it like i should.

However my trout that have plenty of D.O. with inflowing oxygenated well water and they don't feed too much in the morning either. But the bass in my bass pond are hungry morning and evening. Maybe like your hybrids it has something to do with the aggressiveness, competitive nature of a species or their metabolism?

I only have brooks in the trout pond but when I had brooks browns and rainbows they all fed ravinously morning and evening. I have to wonder if competiton may have something to do with that one.

I want to put in a 1/8th H.P. surface aerator in the little 1/10th acre pond next summer and see if it makes any difference.

What brand of aerator makes a 1/8 hp, Cecil?

Bruce,

Can't say exactly why your HSBs feed so good in morning. Maybe it's their instinct to use light as advantage to catch food. Our HSBs have been feeding better at noon than in AM, and I know it may be due to DO.

This is crazy but always, always, always on my ponds, the adult HSB that are fed during the day will feed way better when it's cloudy. Even one single cloud crossing the sun will create a frenzy. Too weird.

As far as I know, the PBoss article by Bruce, Cecil and I, about collecting, raising, selecting, and stocking all male bgill as an alternative form of fishery in a small pond is still a GO. Look for it in a late winter early spring issue if we can get everyone and everything co-ordinated.

I'm not sure what type of information you are specifically looking for from the "grand experiment" of Male Only BGill stocking. I put them in a yellow perch dominated pond and they are growing and doing well. I have not had a successful bgill spawn yet after 4 yrs. I have had a few male bgill in a friend's perch pond for about 9 years now and he has never had a bgill spawn. Since I only deal with a few fish at a time 10 to 40, I have ample time to sort & select and I am able to be real careful when I examine for male bgill and release only several, carefully selected fish at a time into the pond. Bgill with any doubtful sex characters are eaten or put back into a growout feed training cage until the next sorting session. Male bgill are usually 7.75"-8.7" when they go through a final selection and release into the pond. All but a very few of my male bgill go through three or four sortings over a 5 to 16 month period before release into the pond.

My water & air temps in early September are similar to those of Bruce's and Cecil's. Since I raise primarily yellow perch, I changed feeding from 2X per day to once a day when water temps went above 82F. My fish won't feed in the morning because they are strongly conditioned to feeding at noon or dusk. I have only a small group of 2 yr to 3 yr old perch and the male bgill that will feed at mid day; the majority of large perch feed only at dusk and best feeding activity occurs at late dusk. Since the water temps have recently dropped from 86F-88F to the high to mid 70's feedng activity has increased about 25%. I will not resume a midday feeding until the water temps reach low 70's. I do not feed for a production goal; I feed for enjoyment, relaxation, and for decent growth.

Male Only Bgill Status. I have about 40 to 50 male bgill in my 3/4 ac yellow perch dominated pond. I rarely fish for them in the summer. I catch them occassionally while ice fishing. I basically monitor their size and number when I feed them. Each potential male bgill is strongly conditioned in a fish cage to eat fish food before releasing them into the pond. I replace fish for fish when I harvest one or find one dead. Thus I have a range of size of male bgill from 8.5 to 11.75". The newest introductions are in the 8.5"to 9" range. Most of the older males are 10"to 11"+. Since I don't fish them often, I am not sure if there are any 12" bgill present. A couple look 12". Cecil says I always say I have really big fish when I seen them in the water. Smile. A 11.75" (25 oz) bgill died this spring and it had an honorable and photographic burial. So far my bgill seem to be dying of old age before they reach the 12" mark. Bruce by using his selective breeding & feeding technique will probably be the first one to be able to reliably produce several 12"+ bgill.

Thanks for the update. Bill I think it is a great idea to test the male BG only idea and to see what it shows. I have followed it with much interest and think it may show some interesting results. That is why I called it the grand experiment because it is a grand {great} idea . I thank all of you for doing the work and sharing the results and the story with the rest of us. Thanks for the posts today. I was, in addition to the general results, today interested to see if the onset of cooler temps had increased feeding activity and if anyone noticed if the all male ponds had shown a greater increase in feeding over a mixed pond. Our LMB and BG seem to put on a spurt of feeding activity in Sept and Oct. just before cold sets in. I assume this is to add body weight to help survive winter and the next springs spawn. I did not know if an all male population would exibit this but assumed it would , just as other normal BG activity has occured as per Bruce and CB1 reported spawning and feeding related activity earlier this year. I look forward to the article in PB and would hope that the various data/conditions could be made into a chart or report to compare side by side conditions and results and most importantly your observations even if you think they may not meet scientific requirments. Often the reporting of observations even if not scientific give us ideas and fish behavior to watch for and note in our ponds. Thanks again. ewest

Bruce,

That is not weird at all...its standard behavior on all my ponds. BG( and HSB and any fish) will always feed better on cloudy days than bright sun...in fact, under high noon bright sun won't even show themselves. I believe it is a fish's natural protection instincts, as long as they can't be seen, they are comfortable, but turn the light on and they are terrified.

It applies equally well to fishing also...fishing is almost always better under cloudy conditions than clear...the one exception is flats fishing where you must have clear sun to see the fish or you are simply out of luck.

If I ate floating food and had no eyelids, I'd eat better when it was cloudy, too.

For Reference I checked the DO on Sept 4-5 in may larger pond that has the male bgills. At dusk at the surface DO was 7.8 after the aerator had run several hours. The next morning at 8:00am DO near the same spot was 6.5-6.7. Very little decrease in DO overnight which indicates to me that the biological oxygen demand (BOD) at the surface is fairly low in my pond. Aerator did not run during the night.

Bruce, C & H sales, on line, has a small gast rotary vane that only draws 0.55 amps for $40 dollars. Shud be plenty for your small pond. Even if it will not drive a diffuser at your depth, a coiled or laid out soaker hose will do well.