Pond Boss Forums INTRO Questions & Observations Channel Cats

Hi Everyone!

I've been lurking here for some time and finally got around to ordering my subscription to Pond Boss. Just got my first issue and I really enjoyed it. I love this forum - just really great information for new lake owners like me.

I am trying to determine if my channel cats spawned. Everything I've heard and read says that my lake just isn't the correct environment for channel cats to spawn.

Here's the story:

We built our lake in 2002 and it was filled by early 2003. It's roughly 1.5 acres; 8 feet in the deepest parts. There is a small spring-fed creek that feeds the lake. When it rains that creek really gets moving and according to the contractor that built the lake we have about 300 acres of runoff into our 1.5 acre lake. So we have a 3' overflow pipe and an additional emergency spillway to handle the water during heavy rains. Fortunately, the pipe has always been able to handle the water.

In Spring 2003 we stocked the lake with 2-4" bluegill and 6" channel cats and the following year with bass. The channel cats seemed to have disappeared and I wondered if they swam away in the current during heavy rains when the water would have been flowing into the overflow pipe. I finally caught one in 2005 that was about 12" long but never saw another until about 2 weeks ago and my neighbor caught 3 of them in about 2 hours. One was about 14", one was about 12" and one was about 8". Ok, the 12" and 14" make sense but I'm really confused about that 8" cat. He must either be one of the originals from 2003 and he's only grown 2" or they spawned.

Any thoughts?

There is a 3rd possibility, it may have washed in You can get Cats to spawn, if you have breeding grounds for them...hollow logs, 5 gal buckets, or pipe. Running water is in your favor, but LMB & BG usually take out the young ones born in the Spring. Several on this board have been successful with catfish spawning.

I never thought of that. I have seen the ocassional small cat in a few of the other creeks in the area. We did put in some buckets for spawning before we filled the lake but we really didn't expect anything. I was told that they only spawn in deep water. Is that true?

Susan, my thought is that CC will spawn in 3' - 5' of water. This is the range of depth that most of my spawning structures are at. I have had a few CC from a couple of year classes show up in the pond.

Suaan,
I have a pond in similar size to yours. My channel cats don't seem to spawn either. I use the pond as a put and take for channel cats. Some have told me it's best to have a pond our size as a put and take as channel cats are prolific reproducers if the the environment is right. I recently caugt an 8, 6.5 and 4.5 lb channel catfish, but don't see any fry. I put about 25 8 inch newbies in and they are doing well. Good luck.

It's interesting that they may spawn in 3-5' of water. In the back of the pond where the stream enters it is anywhere from 1-5' deep and that is the area where there would be definite water movement. In the spring it's common for it to run very steadily for several weeks. We didn't put any spawning structures back there but it's loaded with downed trees thanks to a very busy beaver.

Susan wrote "I wondered if they swam away in the current during heavy rains when the water would have been flowing into the overflow pipe".

Can anyone shed light on this question? We have the exact size pond and water shed at our home place. Only difference is we don't have a 3' pipe only the emergency spillway around the end of the dam. I was told that they swim upstream in current and don't usally get washed out at least the bigger ones. Is this true?

Our pond was stocked in 1996 with 200 4 to 6 inch CC. After one year they were pan size, next year, 2 lbs, etc... at about 4.5 years we had CC as big as 12 lbs but we also had pan size and in between. It appeared they had spawned, and our pond doesn't have any barrell structure etc only a few christmas trees. There are no ponds above us in the watershed so they would have had to come up the creek to inter the pond unless they did spawn. Anyhow we caught fish successfully up until a few years ago and now they all seem to have disappeared and the BC have taken over. Mr lusk stated that the life of a cc is only 10 to 13 years and that they may have just run out of time and I need to re-stock. I started to do that a few months back when our almost dry ponds caught full but I'm glad I didn't now because they are dropping very fast again with the heat and lack of rain in our area. Maybe next year. What is the average ratio of CC that make it to adult hood Example I stocked 200 in a 1.5 acre pond, how many should I expect to grow to full size? Assuming everthing is balanced etc..

Susan, if you have large rocks, especially flat ones, they will dig under them the create their own bed.