Bill D. is making some thoughtful comments for this topic. Having crappie could likely consume some to maybe significant numbers of the LMB fry (3/4"-1.5") reducing chances of too many LMB. Larger LMB fingerlings would most likely escape crappie predation fro various reasons. Using only crappie as the panfish is as esshup says "what happens when crappie have a poor spawn" which can commonly occur? What feeds the bass intended for trophy status?. Crappie are known for boom and bust spawning recruitment. For this reason, I would not use poorly spawning hybrid crappie nor only male-female crappie as a goal for producing trophy bass. For this to succeed, I think you will need as suggested, one to three additional forage species for when crappie numbers are low density. Even then, chancers of producing several 8 LB+ bass/acre is unlikely using this crappie stocking plan.
If you only want a few crappie as bonus fish the hybrid crappie or only male/female individuals are the best choice.
Crappie and bass may thrive with threadfins and or golden shiners. Large bass would eat significant numbers or sub-harvest size crappies 5"-7" whenever they are common. Problem is we don't have lots of test ponds with crappie to provide reliable information. If you are willing to risk your fishery and then be willing and able to renovate the unbalanced fishery then try your crappie idea. If it were my pond I would first allow the bass to get to the 16"-17" sizes before stocking crappie so ample numbers of bass can consume 5"-6" recruitment crappie.
This thread will be placed into the Archives in the crappie topic.
Last edited by Bill Cody; 01/03/16 04:09 PM.
