Pond Boss Forums INTRO New Forum Member Introduction 3/4 acre pond 2-3ft from top till full. stocking?

i have a 3/4 acre 14ft depth pond that was dug aug. 2010 and its still about 2-3 ft till its full. i put the aquashade in it already and i have an aeration system running at night. my question is when should i start stocking fish and at what rate? i prefer a non-aggressive blue-gill, large mouth bass, crappie, and perch. is there anything i have to do to the pond or check into before stocking it?

Hello Bdawg221 and welcome to Pond Boss, thanks for joining up and posting!

My advice would be to purchase a few pond books (if you don't have them already). My favorites are Bob Lusk's "Perfect Pond Want One" and "Raising Trophy Bass."

Read through all of the free articles available on this site.

Research any fish you intend to introduce into the pond (especially crappie).

I'll let the experts give you more specific advice.

Why did you use the aquashade? There are trade offs from using dyes. They retard photosynthesis needed for phytoplankton production. Phyto is the basis of the pond food chain.

Your pond is too small for crappie.

Non aggressive bluegill? Not sure I understand your thoughts here.

I'll let those form your area chime in on the perch/LMB combo.

I agree with what Dave said about the dye and the crappies, and have the same question about the BG.

I hate to threadjack but I have about the same size pond and I put aquashade in mine too. My pond is in about a 4 acre pasture and from the horse crap and grass clippings my pond gets so much fertilization it turned pea green. I used alum and cleared it, pond had 10' visibility for a couple days. After about 4 days it started to get a green tint. Green got darker and darker till I only had about 4-6 inch visibility. I added cutrine plus and aquashade to kill some of the bloom and filter out uv rays to keep the bloom from taking over again. What am I losing out on because of this, I see where DD1 said that aquashade hampers phytoplankton(sp?) which is the basis of life in the pond. Please explaine, am I better having a super green pond with no vis or a blue pond with a foot and a half of vis. im corn-fused

I've never known horse droppings to have much effect on anything. Their inefficient stomach makes their droppings mostly packed grass.

The fertilizer might be a whole different matter.

If you can get an honest 18 inches of visibility, you ought to be OK.

You can also try F-40 Enviro Blue and F-30 Algae Control. Ck out the web site www.dwiwater.com

TZ - I like your questions and cant wait to hear the answers.


BDawg - Dump minnows in this fall before winter, most of your small fish in the spring (dont do crappie yet)
then if you want bass or another top end preditor put it in next fall.

Do you have any fish habbitat? some would help your minnows survive and reproduce.

To have crappie under control in such a small pond there are a few key elements we guess at. Having a reproducing cro of golden shiners seems to be one of the keys. The other is to have a good fish population all ready established, so as when the young crappie hatch they are gobbled, as is crappie hatch first and grow rapid, feeding on the larva of other fish, out competeing them and giving their own species a high recrutement level. aka, lost of small stunted crappie after a few years, if not managed properly. Of course in such a small pond, fishing them in control is possible too. To save heart ache, wait 2 years or so to introduce crappie. And make sure you have good bait forage.

There are different numbers to figure how many of each fish to put in, are you buying from a hatchery or bucket stocking. If brining in brood in a bucket, make sure they are not sickly or come from bad waters.

What are the primary goals for the pond, fishing or fun, or a good mixture of both?