New 1 acre pond on the border of texas/Oklahoma. Did some initial stocking in early October w/ 2 lbs of FHM and about 20 2" BG. this was a trial run as I stocked some bottom-of-the-barrel fish in early July and pretty sure they all died. These are doing fine now and seeing fry along the banks. Do I need to wait until spring to keep stocking additional forage, or is there any benefit to adding more BG this winter? Plan is for a BG/LMB family fishing pond. Don't need trophies but do want to get to catchable fish ASAP

Hey Pdubdo,

IMO it will not hurt to add more FHM now but they will probably stop spawning once the water temp drops much below 55. Do you have appropriate spawning structure and habitat for them? I also think it would be ok to add more small BG now. Keep in mind you only get to do the initial stocking once so IMO you want to get those BG from a good source with great genetics as you will live with the choices you make now for a long time.

Good Luck,

Bill D.

The Texas Okla border can cover a large area east to west and so maybe its better if I tell you my pond is located just west of Shreveport and just N of I-20. I stocked my fhms, cnbg and res in late Nov with a follow up in Mid Feb and they all did good. I also stocked some brooder Thread fins and we had a cold winter short time but I think it was cold enough I may have lost those TFS brooders but not sure of it. They don't like cold water and are less tolerant than the other fish stocked. Hope this helps you on your goals for your pond.

I will suggest you promote the forage base from closer to the base by increasing allochthonous inputs. Adding hay in clumps around perimeter of pond in shallow water will promote organisms mediating breakdown of the plant residues. Many of those organisms will be invertebrates that even larger Bluegill will consume. Smaller fish will stack up around the clumps to get at the the easier eats and take advantage of what is likely to be increased temperature near the dark colored mass relatively close to the surface. Your LMB may see benefits with changing location of the fish feeding on the invertebrates. The breakdown of the plant residues will release nutrients promoting primary productivity by periphyton and phytoplankton promoting more eats away from the clumps.

Mixed hay of a legume and a cool season grass will give a range of breakdown rates so nutrient availability does not overwhelm consumers or prove to anemic. Hay too rotten for livestock works fine.

This approach I use for crayfish just like done in more southerly localities such as LA. BG under with access to such an augmented forage base will go through winter in better condition. I am not a fan of "head jobs" / emaciated BG, especially as forage for LMB.

Will be gearing up for it shortly to provide a forage base some lesser known fish I want to start spawning in late March / early April. Plant clumps in that case will be maple tree leaves. Oak leaves do not do same job as do not support good breakdown at time I want.

Jim great point, you are an asset to this place for sure. About 3 yrs ago when I had just started up my pond, I used a 1/4 bail of dehydrated Alfalfa spilt into small sections and added them around my ponds edge back when the pond was 1/3 full and it did a great job on getting the pond started up. I mention this because it was easy to locate the bail at the local feed and seed store. I pick up the information here and your posting up did a great job of explaining it all. And Pdubdo Welcome to this Forum, lots and lots of information and good people here.

googling, "allochthonous"...:)
Great points that I hadn't really considered. I thought a couple small brush piles and some Tifton grass I planted in the pond bed would be enough, but I have no algae at all and no aquatic plants have moved in yet. So I'll add some allochthonous input and go from there. Thanks!

So is it a good idea when you are trimming the vegetation on your pond shore to let it fall in the water and leave it?

Jim, I like that suggestion for the new pond!

Yes brand new ponds tend to start out barren. You can jump start the productive process by seeding (adding stuff that will quickly lead to production). I have seen seeding with plankton have limited effect. Hay , and other plant contents will speed things up. Don't use oak or other high tanics in this process as it will slow things down initially.