Please don't laugh at this one but I am considering an all whisker pond (CC and BH). We are having a lot of fun and boy are those BH good to eat.

1/4 acre dug out, aerated, and fed. The goal being large BH. I believe I can use the CC to control the BH numbers. Is this naïve of me?

Other questions to you guys...

1. Long shot here: anybody try this before and what were your experiences?
2. If you had access to any size and number of CC how many of them and how big should I initially stock? My thought here is to use the CC to control the BH numbers. I have never had an issue with CC reproducing. So they would be a put and take.
3. How many BH would you stock?
4. Which species would you stock first?

Thanks for all the inputs. Please don't hold back I would love all experiences and opinions! And bring on the grief for even thinking about an all whisker pond

It all depends on how many pounds you plan on harvesting.

Aerating and feeding, I'll bet you can raise more pounds of fish in that pond than you can eat.

Think of it as an aquaculture pond instead of a sport fish pond. The biomass ultimately depends on the water quality, but there's some crazy numbers (to us pond guys) being produced from aquaculture ponds.

One such pond that I just sterilized will be getting anywhere between 4,000 and 6,000 LMB @ 6"-8" in length next week. Pond is 1.2 surface acres, max depth is 12' over 40% of the pond area. The plan is to raise them to 1.5 - 2 pounds each before seining and shipping to market. The shooters will be culled this fall and sent to market, the remainder will be market size next year.

I really like the idea of an all whiskers pond, but would have two reservations:

1] If you're feeding pellets, CC will preferentially target the pellets, not the BH, and fail to control BH recruitment. CC can be pellet hogs, and lazy if they have enough pellets to subsist.

2] The CC may outcompete the BH for pellets, slowing growth of your primary target species.

How about using a nonpellet eating, nonreproducing predator?

Mnfish, this is just a past experience of mine. We had a 1/8th acre pond max depth 7 foot. Had large BHC & CC in the 8lb range. Pond was located in a horse pasture. I know it had a minnow and bullfrog population. We never caught any form of sunfish, but we did have a single LMB once it got to maybe 3-4lbs it would go in the fryer and go put another stunted bass in from another pond. Fish were fed but just a coffee can full every other day. Had great fishing from that pond for 10+ years before selling property.

I see nothing wrong with a "whiskers-only" pond. However, if it was me, I wouldn't include bullheads. It would on!y be CC. They grow fast. They are fun to catch, and they are delicious. The main filets can be substituted for many other types of freshwater and saltwater fish.

Just yesterday, I used poached CC belies in place of lobster to make Maine-style lobster rolls. The bellies have a very similar texture and taste to lobster. They just have to be skinned on both the outside and inside before cooking.
I
I have one pond that is dedicated to channel cats, hybrid sunfish, and striped bass. It is a lot funfor everyone. It can supply dinner for a bunch of us on very short notice.

Thanks guys...great info. Maybe I'm not completely off my rocker thinking about the whisker only pond. I would really like to have BH's.

What if I manage the pond with the tried and true BG and LMB combination but substitute the BG for BH?

That's the nice thing about the small ponds. It's easy and not expensive to drain, nuke and start over if things don't go as planned.