So, first post here on the site after doing a lot of reading over the past couple of weeks. I wanted to get some opinions. from people who know way more about this than I do. I have been a fisherman for as long as I can remember, and have always wished I could have my own pond. Well, that dream as become a reality, kind of. On my recently acquired farm in central Virginia, there has been a large wet spot for as long as anyone can remember. In point of fact the spring feeding it is marked on the original plat of the property from the mid 1800s. A small pool was dug for the spring to see if it filled. After this pool filled up a larger pool was dug, and now I have two "ponds" I say "ponds" because one is probably 10' x 15' and 3' deep, and the other is 30' x 20' and 4.5' deep. Temperatures from the spring water average about 60-70 in the small pond, and 65-75 in the larger My idea would be to put some sort of predatory fish in the larger pond, and use the smaller pond as a source of forage fish. The spring has a lot of water volume, but hardly any flow, so I may need to aerate for oxygen which won't be a problem.
All of that background information for this question: What kind of predatory fish, and what kind of forage fish. Or any other recommendations that you all have.
Welcome! For your situation I'd say put 1-5 LMB in the larger pond and forage in the other. Why LMB? Because they are easy to source, can become trained easily, and are hardy as far as predatory fish. For forage put both GSH and FHM in your second pond. FHM for when the bass are young and GSH for when they get big and want something big to eat. Try to find feed trained LMB as that is what it will turn into. If you aren't fishing, train them to eat out of your hand.
Found this hatchery for you. I don't know how close it is to you but they have "silver shiners". Those should work for you.
Reading through I found it quite funny that they recommend stocking BH in every pond but don't supply HBG because they aren't all they're cracked up to be.
Just a warning, don't listen to this website, listen to pond boss. After all, what hatchery has BH and GSF?
When resources are extremely tight, simpler food webs are better. I would practice put-grow-and-take omitting use of a forage species. The transfer of energy and mass from forage to predator would result in less harvestable fish. In my area the default fishable species would be Spotted Bass as they are very good at taking advantage of allochthanous inputs (forages that fall in from outside pond). Smallmouth Bass I am not so sure about in that capacity and Largemouth Bass are inferior to Spotted Bass.
Another option is to use only a hybrid sunfish with very low fertility. Best of those hard to find on the market.
The option that would be most fun to me is to stock with a panfish of the sunfish family that can reproduce. Pumpkinseed, Warmouth, Green Sunfish, and Flier all can work for this. You are likely to see reproduction, feeding behavior, territoriality and even a little angling fun for stunted fish small kids would love. I have had small ponds prone to fish kills that still support Warmouth and Fliers quite well. It is fun to stake out lawn chair space near nesting habitat where all but the Flier can provide entertainment 5 months of the year. These guys can be feed trained in pond and you might be able to promote inputs from night flying insects by using a bug zapper.
Aquaculture Cooperative Research / Extension Lincoln University of Missouri
Certainly makes sense that cutting out as much of the middle man as possible so to speak would be the most efficient usage of resources. That in point of fact was my original intention, to try letting the system sustain itself, without my input. I just figured, that if I could provide a forage species on top of what nature would already provide for me, that I could achieve the best of both worlds
