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#496952 09/28/18 12:23 PM
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This weekend I am going to dial down the timer on our TH feeder to 20 seconds twice each day from the 40 seconds twice each day I have been running since early May. That takes the daily feed volume from a total of 2.2 pounds (Aquamax MVP) per day down to 1.1 pounds per day (1.6 acre pond).

My TH LM135 feeder throws 4.3 ounces of MVP every 10 seconds for reference.

Our place is in west central Illinois, just northeast of St. Louis. Fishing is usually over for the season by early November.

Wondering how all of you dial down your feeding as fall approaches and winter nears. The last 2 years I have done it slowly over the month of October. My next move will be to set the timer down to 10 seconds twice each day in Mid-October. After that I will just let the feeder run until the feed is gone and then shut it down for the winter.

What is your procedure? Any better ideas/procedures out there? I welcome any suggestions. Thanks. BM61.


Last edited by bassmaster61; 09/28/18 12:24 PM.

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What are your water temps and are the fish still feeding well?

Slow is better as temps fall. Fall preparatory feeding (eating all sources) for winter is important for BG and LMB overwinter condition.

Article on this in next PB Mag issue - be sure to subscribe.

Last edited by ewest; 09/28/18 12:33 PM.















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I will test the pond temps tomorrow ewest. We have just recently cooled off but the water temps (my guess) are nowhere near 55 degrees at this point...that has been about the low overnight the last couple of weeks. Daytime highs still in the mid-to-upper 70s/low 80s.

Fish were still feeding very well last weekend...still a feeding frenzy!

Looking forward to seeing that article. And yes....I do subscribe!

thanks ewest. BM61.

Last edited by bassmaster61; 09/28/18 01:17 PM.

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They are putting on weight for winter reserves. As long as they are aggressively feeding I would keep the feed rates up.

I hand feed daily so I get to observe every day the activity. I let the fish tell me if they are hungry.

The rates you are feeding are modest anyway. If you were feeding 5 or 10 pounds per acre that would be heavy feeding rates. But anything under 2 is pretty modest.

If it were me I would keep the rate you were feeding up till the fish started taking longer to eat it. But that is just me and I am no expert. I actually increase my rates in the fall over summer rates but I am also a lot further south than you.

Edit: you did not mention if you had aereation. In my opinion that makes a difference in what feeding rates a pond will support without running into water quality issues. I do aereate and have now switched to running the air daytime only to support warmer water temperatures.

Last edited by snrub; 09/29/18 06:54 AM.

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Thanks bassmaster61. The "Article on this in next PB Mag issue - be sure to subscribe.", was for the general audience. Have to do a little sales PR work and hope people are reading and interested.

Fall feeding (eating) is very important and even more so the farther north you live.
















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I observed slower feeding today now that temps have dropped. Surprised me a bit, adjusted feed rates to match.

Last edited by anthropic; 09/29/18 05:51 PM.

7ac 2015 CNBG RES FHM 2016 TP FLMB 2017 NLMB GSH L 2018 TP & 70 HSB PK 2019 TP RBT 2020 TFS TP 25 HSB 250 F1,L,RBT -206 2021 TFS TP GSH L,-312 2022 GSH TP CR TFS RBT -234, 2023 BG TP TFS NLMB, -160




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I had the same thing here today. Feeding was way off. I'm gonna have to go back to dry feed instead of hydrating so I don't have to waste it.


.10 surface acre pond, 10.5 foot deep. SW LA. The epitome of a mutt pond. BG, LMB, GSF, RES, BH, Warmouth, Longear Sunfish, Gambusia,Mud Minnows, Crappie, and now shiners!!...I subscribe!!
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Well I thought it was my muddy water clarity that had my feeding way off with a visibility now of only about 6 inches. But it sounds like my Louisiana neighbors are experiencing the same thing. Really surprises me because water temps are in the 70's and they should be tearing it up. In comparison...what visibility do you guys have??


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My cnbg are still feeding pretty good, maybe a slight slowdown but not much. Food is still gone after a couple of min. Fishing in the pond is really good right now. LMB, HSB and CNBG are biting right now. Oh! my visibility is 25" and the pond is pretty much at full pool. But I did run the water well in July and August so the pond would not drop as low as it did last summer. I have also had a lot more rain the past 90 days. More than I had in the past two years during the same time. I'm really pleased with it all right now.

Last edited by TGW1; 09/30/18 07:10 AM.

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Flame,
Even with all the rain we've gotten and are still getting, my visibility has never been less than 16". Yesterday it was closer to 36", and surface temp at daybreak is still 80*.


.10 surface acre pond, 10.5 foot deep. SW LA. The epitome of a mutt pond. BG, LMB, GSF, RES, BH, Warmouth, Longear Sunfish, Gambusia,Mud Minnows, Crappie, and now shiners!!...I subscribe!!
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Tested the water temps in our 3 ponds and all were in the 65-68 degree range two feet under the surface. Fish are feeding very well but I still dialed down the timer on the TH to 20 seconds twice per day (1.1 lbs. total feed each day in that 1.6 acre pond) from the prior 40 seconds twice each day.

Looks like all 3 ponds are thinking about turning over as our night temps have been down in the mid to upper 50s over the last 10-14 days. Visibility is dropping.

I have a little over 30 lbs. of MVP pellets left in the feeder so at a touch over a pound per day it looks like it will run dry around Halloween. I will shut it down for the season after that as the water temp should be below 55 by then if history is any indicator.

Enjoy your fall fishing. BM61.

Last edited by bassmaster61; 10/04/18 03:54 PM.

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Keep an eye on things and report back what temp they stop eating.
















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Visibility about 26 inches, murkier than usual 36 to 42 inches. Water around 78, down from mid 80s.

Last edited by anthropic; 10/01/18 01:51 PM.

7ac 2015 CNBG RES FHM 2016 TP FLMB 2017 NLMB GSH L 2018 TP & 70 HSB PK 2019 TP RBT 2020 TFS TP 25 HSB 250 F1,L,RBT -206 2021 TFS TP GSH L,-312 2022 GSH TP CR TFS RBT -234, 2023 BG TP TFS NLMB, -160




anthropic #497076 10/01/18 04:01 PM
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Originally Posted By: anthropic
Visibility about 26 inches, murkier than usual 36 to 42 inches. Water around 78, down from mid 80s.


How did your fish feed today?

My surface temp is still teetering on 80*, but feeding was still off this afternoon. Visibility still around 24". I switched to completely dry pellets instead of hydrating to prevent throwing excess food. They ate it, but it took a while and very lethargic. We've got another system moving in from the south, so it could be barometric pressure causing their finickiness.


.10 surface acre pond, 10.5 foot deep. SW LA. The epitome of a mutt pond. BG, LMB, GSF, RES, BH, Warmouth, Longear Sunfish, Gambusia,Mud Minnows, Crappie, and now shiners!!...I subscribe!!
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I understand why our northern guys are cutting back the feeder times, but with water temps in the upper 70's, I'm having a hard time understanding the diminished feeding down here. Our water's setting at 76-80 degrees, and I've doubled my feeder throw times as our cnbg are gorging with the cooler water temps.

Also, my big pond has the same brown water with low visibility as described by others. I never see that in the summer months, but the same thing happened here this spring several times. To the best of my knowledge, every time this has happens is after a algae bloom.

Question. Could our warm water coupled with cooler rainfall kill the algae bloom and cause the brown tinted water?


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I'm at a loss to understand why the feeding has fell off. I fully expected to see my fish jumping out of the water by now but it's just the opposite. My only reasoning is due to such unstable weather and heavy cloud cover every day.

My water had turned brown with heavy rains but is slowly getting back to olive green with at least a few hours of sunshine recently. Still running aerator at night but that's liable to change this weekend to a daytime schedule.


.10 surface acre pond, 10.5 foot deep. SW LA. The epitome of a mutt pond. BG, LMB, GSF, RES, BH, Warmouth, Longear Sunfish, Gambusia,Mud Minnows, Crappie, and now shiners!!...I subscribe!!
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Originally Posted By: Mike Whatley
I'm at a loss to understand why the feeding has fell off. I fully expected to see my fish jumping out of the water by now but it's just the opposite. My only reasoning is due to such unstable weather and heavy cloud cover every day.

My water had turned brown with heavy rains but is slowly getting back to olive green with at least a few hours of sunshine recently. Still running aerator at night but that's liable to change this weekend to a daytime schedule.


My fish will occasionally quit feeding for a week or two at a time. I tend to blame it on a hatch of some sort that they're gorging on.


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The water column temps at my pond dropped 10 degrees about a week ago which led me to change the aerator times to the daytime instead of nights. This has caused the feeding to fall off considerably and I don't think you could catch one on a hook if you were starving to death. I have since cut the feed in half as well.

I am afraid that messing with the aerator schedule to try and compensate for temperatures has really messed with the fish's routine. I suppose that there could be other reasons, but, besides the temp drop, that' all I can come up with. The clarity has stayed the same. I am now running the air from 9am to 1 pm and plan to tapper that schedule as fall ensues. I'm not sure that the benefits, what little there may be, of altering the air schedule to compensate for fall season temps are not overtaken by the loss of feeding benefits.


Fish on!,
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Fast temp drops can cause havoc on many pond fish species. It can even lead to death. As cold blooded animals their metabolism drops quickly with rapid temp changes. Lipid (fat) imbalances occur , muscles stiffen and death can follow.


A PB mag article in the next issue discusses this - it is one issue to late for timing purposes. If you aren't a PB mag subscriber you need to order a subscription. Here is one tidbit from the article.

It is believed that the lipid composition in the fish muscle plays a vital role in the ability of fish to adapt from one temperature to another. First, temperature determines the rate of chemical reactions, and secondly, temperature dictates the point of balance between the formation and disruption of the macromolecular structures in biological membranes. Structural flexibility, therefore, is a requirement for integrity of biological membranes. Cold temperatures constrain this flexibility. The fat apparently hardens in the colder water, causing the fat-impregnated muscles to stiffen and the fish to become exhausted and lose movement followed by death.

At 70F BG should be very active and consuming lots of food.

Brown plankton often occurs late in the summer plankton growing season as we move toward fall.

Last edited by ewest; 10/02/18 12:26 PM.















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Even with all the rain and cloud cover we've had the last few weeks, my surface temps are still hanging close to 80*f. I'm hoping as the temp continues to drop, feeding will pick up. As of today, they're still timid to feed. To be honest, they fed better when my surface temps were 90+.

Aeration still going 6 hrs from 2-8a, visibility is 30" and last ph test was 8.0. No reason I can think of as to what's put them off the last few days.


.10 surface acre pond, 10.5 foot deep. SW LA. The epitome of a mutt pond. BG, LMB, GSF, RES, BH, Warmouth, Longear Sunfish, Gambusia,Mud Minnows, Crappie, and now shiners!!...I subscribe!!
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Eric, thanks for the info.


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Great info Eric! I'm looking forward to reading the article! Do you think that fish that are fed to obesity and very high Relative Weights are more susceptible to this type of stress/kill?

Last edited by Bill D.; 10/02/18 08:11 PM. Reason: clarification

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Originally Posted By: Mike Whatley
Originally Posted By: anthropic
Visibility about 26 inches, murkier than usual 36 to 42 inches. Water around 78, down from mid 80s.


How did your fish feed today?

My surface temp is still teetering on 80*, but feeding was still off this afternoon. Visibility still around 24". I switched to completely dry pellets instead of hydrating to prevent throwing excess food. They ate it, but it took a while and very lethargic. We've got another system moving in from the south, so it could be barometric pressure causing their finickiness.


Could be that recent rain (after a long drought) and lower temps shocked fish a bit, especially southern strain F LMB and CNBG. I'm seeing tons of small YOY fish, a welcome change from last year, which could also explain why larger fish have full tummies & are less interested in feed.

Wasn't out at my BOW today, it's an hour drive so I'm not there every day. With new mobile home, I plan to show up a lot more often! grin

Last edited by anthropic; 10/02/18 11:36 PM.

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Bill D. #497151 10/03/18 07:18 AM
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Originally Posted By: Bill D.
Do you think that fish that are fed to obesity and very high Relative Weights are more susceptible to this type of stress/kill?


I woke up early this morning wondering the same thing. Higher fat content may equal higher water temp preference. Kinda like regular diesel compared to winter diesel.


Fish on!,
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My fish slowed down on feed for a couple days when a cold front and rain happened. But they are back to voratious as of last night.


John

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