Thanks everyone for the information. We are buying from Osage Catfisheries in Missouri, which came highly recommended by a very knowledgeable nearby pond manager. However, even they have given me somewhat conflicting advice on Crappie, depending on who I talk to at Osage. Based on replies on this site, it appears we should avoid the Crappie altogether. It's too bad, because I love the taste of crappie. There are three partners in the farm and we all live an hour away. We will not be able to apply a lot fishing pressure.
In case it makes a difference, we just bought a fish feeder and plan to feed our fish. Also, the pond has a small spring running into it. Even during last summer's drought we were only about 18 inches below full pool, even though the spring stopped running on the surface. We are now completely full. I assume the 25 foot depth of the pond helped with water retention.
We left a ridge in deep water and have some rocky shelves, in addition to trees we cut and left in the pond for structure. Most of the trees were positioned so that some of the branches are still above the water, so we would know where they are and insects and would land on them and fall in the water.
If anyone has any other advice about feeding or whether we should aerate, or whether we should consider species other than CC, BG, HBG, FHM and LMB, please reply. I have no clue as to what I'm doing.
I learned of this site from two friends who manage large ponds and raved about this thing the only place to go. They suggested that I subscribe to the magazine, which I did.
