I just wanted to take some time on this rainy winter day to thank all of you on the forum who have supported us over the years through direct support as well as referrals. From our start, we have worked very hard to earn your trust, produce and provide high quality fish, and to provide the best customer service possible. We certainly are not perfect, but we are still working hard to improve in all aspects of life, business, and fisheries management. We are so thankful and appreciative for this forum and the sense of community that has developed here. We hope everyone has a fantastic 2020, and that all of your fishy dreams come true.

My Overton feed trained LMB and HSB are doing great! Your business has been great to work with, and will need to get a few more HSB as I start to ladder stock. Might even grab a few of those Florida's next round.

Todd
We thank you for all the things you do for all of us. Keep it up. Gig Em

Todd, everything about you guys has been great. Keep up the good work. (Hard work)!!!

Todd, what is the situation re threadfin shad? I ordered some from another supplier last year but never got any, trying to cover my bases this time.

Todd, It's good to hear from you. I have a small order for you coming up pretty soon and looking forward to seeing you again.

Todd how about a post or two on what you see happening in the business of fish - trends or ideas.

Thanks for checking in.

We are taking orders for shad to be delivered in March/April. They have to be delivered and there is a minimum order of 10,000 shad. We normally inquire carefully about where they are going, in order to make sure the pond or lake is a good candidate first. Fisheries that have high visibility water (low plankton abundance) and are dominated by submerged vegetation are not good candidates for threadfin shad. Good candidates are managed fisheries and/or those with natural plankton abundance. Bottom line... shad stocking is expensive and we want them to self-sustain and thrive where they are stocked.

We will also be offering some shad in July and again in the Fall, from 2020 production.

Thanks Ewest for a lead in to our new product line of aquatic plants. We are working on a plan to produce and offer beneficial aquatic vegetation for habitat enhancement.

We will be offering water iris and arrowhead this year, from some stock that has been propagated on our farm. We have started a small cypress tree farm and should have some small trees available this spring/summer. We are working on our plan to also provide some types of noninvasive water lilies, and we would also like to offer water willow.

Development of this sector will take some time, but we feel like we have the needed resources, and we know there there may be a strong market for beneficial aquatic plants.

We are certainly open to ideas from the PB community regarding types of beneficial aquatic plants that would be in high demand.

On the fish side, hybrid stripers are gaining popularity quickly, and reports from stockings are mostly very positive.

We did restart our production of F1 hybrid largemouth bass in 2018, using our Lone Star Legacy Bass x Inslee Northerns. We repeated this program in 2019, and had great success with feed training and production of enough fingerlings to be able to offer some hold-over stock for Fall sales also. In addition, we were successful in feed-training Lone Star Legacy Bass in 2019, so those sold out like hotcakes. We will continue these production programs in 2020.

Thanks for the update, Todd. I like the idea of marketing desirable aquatic plants, especially as a way of keeping out undesirable plants & reducing excess fertility.

If I recall correctly, you folks stocked rainbows in my pond back in early December. They've done better than I imagined, perhaps because I'm still feeding. Caught one that grew from 1 lb to 2.5 lb in just two months! At this rate I'm hoping to catch some in the 3 to 4 lb class before it all comes to a sad end in June.

Re desirable plants, American pondweed comes to mind. It's slowly spreading at my place & fishing has improved, probably due to increased survival of young of year.

Todd, Feed trained Lone Star Legacy lmb! I thought feed training Florida lmb was hard if not impossible to do. I could see why they sold like Hotcakes. Can you tell us what you are seeing in growth rates and any other info on these lmb.

Yes Tracy they were much harder to feed-train, and we tried many times in the past. But we never gave up, and that approach finally paid off.

Just as Trump says, "Never ever give up!"

Quite the combo. Understated potential.

Todd, Outstanding work with what you have done. I am thinking feed trained northern lmb 8 lbs potential and maybe a little more. But the Legacy's feed trained maybe 20+ lbs or more. And the same goes with the F/1's. WOW! I think you should get a star by your name.

Todd, I'm from MI but I know many on this forum are very interested in getting a supplier and a reliable source for Lake Chubsuckers. If I recall about 5 years ago you stated in a thread that you were growing them and hoped they would work out as a new forage species for your business.

If it could be worked out, you would be probably the only source and many of us would benefit. They would work in a big variety of climates and have several unique advantages over other more traditional forage fish.

Can you tell us why the LCS project didn't succeed, or what you learned? Can you try that project again?

Thanks

Can we order smaller qty's of the F1 and stripers? As in like 20 or 30 of each?

if you pick 'em up....I bet they'd sell any quantity

Yup Todd aims to please!

Maybe you can make Highflyers get together and then head to Overton's for their Saturday sales events. I understand that one should usually pick ones fish from a local supplier and wanting local genetics but I think when talking about HSB I don't think that applies so much. I am betting he can package 10" hsb for a long trip. I am not sure how he or if he does his F 1's the same way. There are some here that have home built transfer tanks. I have a Hugh cooler that I have made into a transfer tank (4' by 3') or Todd has bagged 10" hsb for me and others.

Getting away for a weekend tht time a year is just about impossible for me. Just got off a 3 week vacation with a cruise also. I do want to make it to 1 of them just dont think I can do it this time of year.

We succeeded in producing lake chubsucker fingerlings, and did in fact stock them out here locally. However, most folks don't know anything about this fish. With its unusual and strange "fishy" name, we found ourselves bogged down trying to promote fish that these local good ol boys have never heard of.... LOL Plus this endeavor takes up a pond worth of space, and we can't afford to experiment when we are trying to max out farm production with proven high demand species.

Rats, so close and yet so far away!! I can see that hot-selling fish will take precedent over these less-glamorous forage fish.

Any word on how self-sustaining the LCS were? Was it tricky to get them to spawn successfully in captivity? I've read they are picky about clean water and need lots of vegetation for their sticky eggs. Did you use spawning mats?

If we could find a source to get started it would be awesome to see if fish farms up here in the north could reproduce what you had success with.

Got my LCS going with just 12, 3" fish, but at the time, I had a mess of curly pond weed in my YP/SMB pond for cover (mostly gone now). Based on the number of LCS that have washed out the exit tube, they are spawning and growing well. I also have RES and GSH in the pond. The growth on the SMB has been excellent and they too are spawning. Have not seen any RES, but everything else has multiplied. Moved some stranded LCS that came out the overflow tube to a new 1/2 acre pond that only has FHM in it, but plant growth in the new one is almost non-existent, and while I see schools of tiny fish, I don't see many larger fish (even FHM) in this new pond. Think the pond just needs some time.

Lake chubsuckers (LCS) are a limited small business opportunity because no one specializes in growing them. Not everyone wants a big business - someone might be just looking for a rewarding hobby. Some Pond Boss member or relative should look into growing LCS, grass shrimp and maybe pumpkinseed sunfish(PS) or even hybrid PS X RES. All might be able to be raised in the same pond? These species seem to have a demand yet are a rarity.

Just outta curiosity what kind of permits do you have to get to sell fish.

We were successful in spawning LCS by introducing broodstock into a clean pond, then allowing bushy pondweed to grow unchecked for a full season. The following season we treated the weeds and harvested the pond. Was an easy program, did not require any feed or other costly measures.