Pond Boss Forums STOCKING A NEW POND Creating the food chain HELP Fish Winter Feeding in New Pond

I am wondering if what I am doing is OK. I've read some on this board and what others say about the 50 degrees thing. But I think my fish are starving -- SO I continue to feed them every couple of days thru the winter. I don't see them (no dead fish floating around). Our new pond was dug this summer, is about 18 feet now (thanks to all this rain). I've put about 600 small fish and about 4,000 fatheads & minnows not thinking the water would get this deep so soon (going to finish the fish population in the spring). I've been told that fish will stay on the deep end (kind of hibernating). Is this right? Do I continue to feed them? How do I know what is enough if I don't see them eating but waiting for the food to sink?????

What type of fish? If they are warmwater fish like BG or LMB their metabolism slows way down as the water gets cold (below 50). They don't need much food. They will move to the warmest water often the deepest water in the pond as the surface water gets cold.

Mark, being in Indiana, I'm guessing your surface water temps are gonna be in the 35 to 40 range. Very few species of fish will surface feed at those temperatures. In my pond only Golden Shiners would feed when it's that cold, and then only when they were very crowded (and hence shorter on food).

But not eating feed in the Winter is AOK for them, because their metabolism is so low right now. To use LMB as an example, their metabolism drops by a factor of 2 for every 8 deg F drop in water temperature. So the LMB that was so voracious last Summer, when the water was 80 deg F, only needs about 1/32 as much to eat when the water is 40 deg F. Other species have similar falloffs in their food needs in the Winter.

Some species can also have health problems from eating commercial fish feed in cold water, because even high protein feed is usually higher in carbohydrates than natural food for these species. They have trouble digesting the carbs when it's cold and the feed can therefore make them sick.

Ewest has the particulars on this if you are interested.

The bottom line is the fish really don't need the feed now.

Thanks that what I needed to know. I will quit the feeding (I had read that i could make them sick, don't want that). Right now, I have BG, LMB and some Georgia Giants, and Catfish.