I normally have my son walk around our 1.5 acre pond once every 2 days and throw handfuls of catfish food I get from the local feed store. I think its fme catfish food anyway I was curious if the bluegill will also eat that or if I need to get a specific food for them too and feed both every 2 days

Pellet size is important. I believe the food should be about 25% of the fishes mouth gape. BG should eat your catfish food so long as it's the correct size even though there are better foods designed for panfish. Timing is also important. Feed at the same times everyday to get things started off as quickly as possible.

Thanks for the info I actually had my feed store order some catfish fingerling food that looks promising and way cheaper then the stuff on the forum everyone is talking about the purina dlgamefish and others

Here are the specs what do you think

FRM CATFISH FINGERLING GROWER

GUARANTEED ANALYSIS:
Crude Protein, Min…………………… 35.00%
Crude Fat, Min…………………………. 2.50%
Crude Fiber, Max. ……………………..7.00%
Phosphorus, Min………………………. 0.70%

Ingredients:
Plant Protein Products, Animal Protein Products, Grain Products, Processed Grain By-Products, Forage Products, Vitamin A Supplement, Vitamin D3 Supplement, Vitamin E Supplement, Riboflavin, Pantothenic Acid, Niacin, Vitamin B12 Supplement, Choline Chloride, Menadione Sodium Bisulfite, Thiamine Mononitrate, Ascorbic Acid, Pyridoxine Hydrochloride, Folic Acid, Ethoxyquin A Preservative, Salt, Dicalcium Phosphate, and Traces of Manganous Oxide, Calcium Iodate, Copper Oxide, Cobalt Carbonate, Zinc Oxide, and Iron Carbonate.

Ruminant Free

Only $22 per 50lbs so I'm gonna try it

SM, looks like your catfish feed is fine. For catfish. But bluegills like more protein, particularly fishmeal, to grow their best. Problem is the fishmeal products are expensive as all get out, at least twice what you pay.

If you have a fertile pond, you are in a better position not to spend so much on fish food. I don't, unfortunately, so must feed lots of expensive stuff!

any feed can be better than none, and I'm sure your boy enjoys feeding those fish....so I wouldn't worry about it that much. If you want a higher quality BG specific type of feed, by all means you should get some, but if you want cheap, local and easy then you can keep using the feed store product. I feed with cheap, local and easy feed on my pond

I like the AM600 by Purina it has 42 percent protein in it and the fishmeal you need but yes it is pricey. With that said it kinda depends on your goals. I also mix some stuff at TSP call Trophy Fish Food. It's a bit cheaper not quite as good but they like it also and it has smaller bits in it for the smaller BG. It's funny I was talking here one day about how my small fish cant eat the AM600 very well as it's to big. And EWEST said well why don't you mix it?? LOL Duh!!! Sense I have done that everyone is happy now. You will still get decent size BG with the catfish food your using, but like I said if your goal is to raise some monsters they may not get there with that food. Just keep that in mind.

RC

Some food is better than none. Good food is better than bad food. Too much bad food can cause issues. The more you rely on feed the more important it is to use the proper type.

Look at the major ingredients
" Plant Protein Products, Animal Protein Products, Grain Products, Processed Grain"

The key for BG and LMB are the type of protein - not all animal protein is digestible and they don't use plant protein well if at all - see below. CC can use those ingredients so that is why CC food is different from Gamefish food.

Here are excerpts from a PB Conference on Fish Nutrition

The immense variety of cultured finfish species hampers efforts to simplify production industry wide. Approximately 170 taxa are currently cultured, including carnivores, herbivores, planktivores, and omnivores, each posing its own set of nutritional demands .

Fish meal has proven to be an excellent dietary protein source for finfish, leading to its description as an ‘‘ideal protein.’’ The ideal protein concept is based on the premise that if the amino acid profile of the feed mimics the whole-body amino acid profile of the animal being fed, protein utilization and growth should be maximized

Lipids, fatty acids, and their derivatives play a role in virtually every physiological process that occurs and for this reason dietary lipid composition and content represent a massive sector of overall nutrition. Nowhere is this more true than in finfish nutrition where lipid can exceed protein in the body composition of finfish, a testament to the physiological and energetic importance of this nutrient class (Tocher2003). Aside from physiological importance, lipids are indispensable energy sources, especially for finfish, which are not well-adapted to carbohydrate utilization.

Dietary protein and energy must be kept in proper balance because a deficiency or excess of dietary energy can reduce growth rates. Fish fed diets deficient in energy will metabolize more expensive dietary protein to meet energy requirements. Excess dietary energy can decrease protein intake and suppress growth.

finfish do not require carbohydrates in their diet, … complex carbohydrates cannot be digested and utilized efficiently by most finfish species. A general dichotomy exists in the carbohydrate digestive ability of warmwater omnivores and herbivores versus the inability of coolwater and coldwater carnivores, which lack the appropriate function necessary for digestion of carbohydrates.

 For this reason, diets fed to these fish rarely contain more than 20% complex carbohydrate

Conversely, warmwater omnivores or herbivores (e.g., channel catfish, tilapia, common carp, and white sturgeon) adapt well to diets containing as much as 40% dietary carbohydrate .

Although vitamins and minerals are required in minute amounts compared with protein, lipid, and so forth, they are critically important, … Every micronutrient has a deficiency disease associated with it, the effects of which are sometimes irreversible or fatal. For a few vitamins and most minerals, excess can be equally detrimental, resulting in toxicity.

Thanks for all the Info. The pond was built in the 90's and everything in there looks good but my LMB are all in the 10"-12" range and small so I read the best thing is to try and bump the BG up and or get rid of some of the bass which I have been doing. We are gonna try out the new food mixed with .maybe adding some fathead minnows on our next fish by day that comes to the local store and see what that does. The BG are pretty big I mean bigger then any I ever caught in California where I grew up and the catfish are all at least 18" and big so just need to bump up the bass sizes

May need to take out some CC.

Ewest did a good job for you, However, all fish food has protein. But, they don't say what type of protein it is. Lots of the Feed Store feeds have protein that is suspicious. I'm talking about chicken feathers. It is high protein but is undigestible by fish.

I would switch to a feed that is made be either Cargill, Skretting, Optimal or Purina. They are in the business of keeping guys like us happy.

Yep, it's a couple of bucks more expensive.