Pond Boss Forums Thread Like Summary - Stocking Advice for New 2 Acre Northern Pond

After many years of planning our dugout pond, construction is now underway. When complete it should have about 2 surface acres of water and have max depths around 22 feet. The soil is blue clay all the way down, so it should hold water well. Precipitation on the pond itself and a surrounding 3 acre watershed should roughly match evaporation, and any shortfall will be covered with a well. The pond will have bottom aeration throughout, although I don’t currently plan to run it during the winter so that the ice will be safe for skating.

One of the unique features of the pond will be a 500’ long man-made stream that circulates water from one end of the pond back to the other. The stream will be powered by what I call “the bubble wall”, which is a 25’ long concrete wall with twenty seven 4” air lift pumps that run through it. Together these airlifts should pull roughly 2400 gpm of water through the wall and into the stream, where it will circulate around and back into the pond. This should be enough to create a 1 ft/s flow through a 1.5’ deep, 12’ wide stream with a gravel bed. We figure this flowing stream should 1) help with filtration, 2) allow us to collect any floating debris at the mouth of the stream (like a big pool skimmer), 3) provide good refuge for forage fish and fry, and 4) be fun for kids to play in. Attached below is a picture of the pond layout.

I’m wondering what fish people think we should stock. The pond is located in Ontario Canada, with a climate similar to northern Michigan. Our priorities (in order) are 1) low maintenance 2) fun fishing for inexperienced anglers (ie kids) and 3) good eating. I'm not a huge fisherman myself so I have done as much research on the forums as I can, but advice from others here would be appreciated.

One thought was rainbows, being relatively easy to hook, fun to fight, and good to eat.

Another was walleye, as perhaps they might actually reproduce in the stream, and would be great to eat. But perhaps they would be hard to hook and not as much fun to fight.

Or perhaps small mouth bass as easy to hook and fun to fight, but perhaps not as great to eat.

Or some mix of the three.

Or perhaps something else entirely.

What do you all think? What would you stock?

Attached Images

Not sure where you are in Canada, but lots of Brookies up there. I guess it would depend on you specific body of water and water temps. However, their temp requirements aren't THAT much lower than rainbows. I just do not like the idea of always having to restock fish because they won't reproduce. 4corners is right too, Tiger Trout are awesome as well, but sterile! I would 100% go with Tigers over rainbows.

Ted, you have to start with the forage fish. Think about it this way.

If you put a bunch of cattle in a fenced field with bare dirt, how well do you think they will do? How hard would it be to get grass/hay established in that field with them in the field already?

I'm no expert, ted, but I'd have thought minnows first, panfish second, and predators in 2023. Bass and walleye need larger prey than minnows to grow sizable.