Hey everybody I'm new to this forum but I was wondering what would I should do for my ponds I have two. In one pond it is about an acre and the bass in it are kind or slim I've caught some bass in there excess of 20" long but not much stomach on any of them. The other pond is around 2.5 acres and there are lots of big bluegill and lots of aggressive small bass in length and girth. These are old ponds but the 2.5 acre pond had been stocked with bass but I think there are way too many bass in the pond I can recall last year catching 30 10" bass in about three hours last summer. I was wondering if feeding them floating pellets would help and if so how long would it take the fish to catch on to that stuff actually being food.
Hookedup,
We're glad you found us. You have two classic pond issues.
It sounds like the 2.5 acre pond is a perfect setup for big bluegill. That is how I try to keep my pond -- lots of small hungry bass to keep the bluegill population down, so there are fewer bluegill to eat all the food. The remaining bluegill grow to fantastic sizes.
As you surmised, the other pond sounds like it doesn't have anywhere enough food for the bass. The primary food for the bass will be bluegill. You probably won't be able to teach your bass to eat, but if you establish a good bluegill population in that pond, the bluegill will be more than happy to eat. They will reproduce, and provide forage for the bass. In that case, you will want a pond with so many bluegill that they don't get very big. You will have to keep a close eye on the bass population to make sure they don't overpopulate their food supply.
Regards and Welcome,
Ken
Hookedup12, Ken is right from what you describe. The only thing that I can add is that you probably should take out some LMB from the smaller of the 2 ponds. Each LMB needs 10# of forage to gain 1# in weight. It's easier for them to do that if there are less mouths to feed. If you go to the archives, look for a Relative Weight Chart for LMB, you will get a good idea what a LMB of "X" length should weigh. If the fish in your smaller pond weigh less than that, take some out.
This depends on your goals. What are your goals for each of the ponds?
Thank you ken I do need to add some more forage for these bass. Would it be good to stock the one acre pond with fathead or not since it's not a new pond but them again Ive heard it's just a good immediate meal fOr them but the probably won't have time to spawn before there all gone. Or just spend my money on more gills and pellets and cover
The larger one I might leave for big gills and just let the kids and first time fishers have fun with it but as far as the small pond close to my house I want to have quality/trophy bass. I may try to harvest a lot of the bass in the small pond and add tiger bass after awhile so I could let the gills flourish before I put anything in
I'd spend $ on removing some underweight LMB, adding cover, then BG. Give them some place to hide. I doubt that the FHM would last a week.
Plus optimal food for the LMB is 1/4 to 1/3 their body length.
18" LMB eating a FHM would be like you or me eating rice one grain at a time. Lots of effort for little food.
Esshup great advice I totally understand where your going. I think Im gonna go with providing more cover, harvest bass and add some more bluegill to the pond so they won't get too big for the bass to eat. What you guys think???
The only caveat to cover is that if there is too much it makes it too hard for the LMB to catch their dinner. 10%-20% of surface pond area should be roughly the amount of cover in the pond for a general fishing pond.
When I bought my place, there were two ponds on it, on about 1/2 acre and the other about 2.5 acres. Both were full of stunted bass and crappie, and absolutely no bait fish. At the bigger pond there was so little food for the fish that in the spring and summer the small bass were constantly breaking the water, jumping I assume at insects in desperation. I could catch a bass a cast. We fished it hard, throwing the too small to clean bass up on the bank, the coons had a feast. After taking I don't know how many bass, I purchased coppernose BG and introduced them. We are now catching larger bass and have an established coppernose population. If you have this problem , don't waist your money on bait fish, until you thin out your bass and crappie numbers.