Pond Boss
Posted By: RC51 Caught a few fish Friday night - 09/19/17 04:59 PM
3 HSB and one nice BG.

The HSB were about 17 inches long and the BG was 9.5 inches.

Needless to say they were tasty... lol

RC



Attached picture Fish.jpg
Posted By: Snakebite Re: Caught a few fish Friday night - 09/19/17 11:12 PM
Nice catches. How old would you guess the HSB are?
Posted By: xraytrapper Re: Caught a few fish Friday night - 09/20/17 05:01 AM
nice looking fish. I can't wait until my HSB and HBG get eating size
Posted By: RC51 Re: Caught a few fish Friday night - 09/20/17 12:22 PM
Originally Posted By: Snakebite
Nice catches. How old would you guess the HSB are?


Hey Snake I can tell you for sure. Those HSB were put in my pond at 8 to 10 inches last April. And they are already 17 to 18 inches. They basically have double in size in a little over a year. They eat up my AM600 at this point. I'm sure that is helping. My 5.5 to 6 pounders I have I put in the pond in April of 2013. Man you hook one of those hogs and you better hold on!!! lol

RC
Posted By: Bill D. Re: Caught a few fish Friday night - 09/20/17 12:43 PM
Nice fish RC. Congrats!

I'm planning to start doing some fall harvest at my place soon. Hope I do as well.
Posted By: RC51 Re: Caught a few fish Friday night - 09/20/17 01:11 PM
Thanks Bill they just happened to be a little more aggressive Friday we got lucky. FYI folks every one of these HSB died on me in a holding pen. I wanted to see if they would make it or not before we cleaned them in this warmer water and they didn't. So unless you have a special way of reviving these fish like the Late Great Mr. George did you better keep them if they are over 2 pounds I would say unless your water is much cooler then they might make it. These guys were pushing 2.8 to 3 pound mark and they faught so hard they just couldn't revive.

RC
Posted By: peachgrower Re: Caught a few fish Friday night - 09/20/17 02:29 PM
Hey RC, nice catch...I do not have any HSB, but was wondering what was your deciding factor in stocking them?? What is your favorite aspect of them? Do you have other predators in your BOW like LMB or mainly HSB?? The more you post those the more I want to put some in my BOW.

PS...what does the tiger stand for?? Just curious.
Posted By: RC51 Re: Caught a few fish Friday night - 09/20/17 03:32 PM
The Tiger lol my attitude about getting old and refusing to do so!! LOL. Dang Father time keeps catching up with me though... ugh. Same with my quote I got no time for ruts and graves.... lol

I have RES/CNBG/LMB and HSB in my pond. Deciding factor for putting them in my pond. I really just wanted a bonus fish. I love my LMB but they can be picky biters at times so like this night HSB and BG were hitting LMB were not and we still had some fun.

Here are some pros and cons about HSB I think,

Pros
1. Will fight till they die I mean this fish is a bull even the 17 inch ones fight hard man!!
2. You don't catch them all the time but fun when you do.
3. They taste GREAT!!!! I couldn't believe it I mean they are right up there real close to the BG. Just get rid of the center red meat part when you clean them and you cant beat these fish for the table!
4. Easy to get at Keo's fish farm and have in my pond in a hour or so from pickup I believe the last ones I got were $1.30 each.
5. They don't reproduce so you can control them much better as to what you do or don't have and get more or keep more depending on your needs.

Cons,
1. They can become a little hook shy if you catch to many times and let them go (In colder water temps only)
2. They will die on you if you catch one once they reach 2.5 plus pounds in the summer hot water. Unless you have a very GOOD revive tank in place to revive them like Mr. George did.
3. And this can be a pro or a con I guess depending your situation. Once they get to be 5 to 6 pounds like my big ones are now they pretty much stop eating my AM600 and eat live fish. BG and minnows and shiners and such. I don't feed any LM Pellets maybe I should try.

Overall I am quite happy with them and they taste GREAT! And the kids love to get one on the hook. Then it's crazy time!! LOL Trust me with light tackle these 17 inchers will steer you wherever they want to go, you better have your drag set right.... smile

RC
Posted By: RC51 Re: Caught a few fish Friday night - 09/20/17 03:39 PM
Here is another pic a little blurry but you can see here they are quite fat and long already.



Attached picture HSBand BG.jpg
Posted By: SetterGuy Re: Caught a few fish Friday night - 09/21/17 10:50 AM
You kill me with your HSB pics! I think mine must have died. Stocked two years ago, I've not seen one since. I may have to see if I can get ahold of some dynamite.. wink
Posted By: RC51 Re: Caught a few fish Friday night - 09/21/17 12:20 PM
Originally Posted By: SetterGuy
You kill me with your HSB pics! I think mine must have died. Stocked two years ago, I've not seen one since. I may have to see if I can get ahold of some dynamite.. wink


Setter how many did you stock? Do you feed them? If so do you ever see them hitting the surface for food? You can tell when they hit it sounds like someone just did a canon ball off the dock... lol

They are there I bet. Remember HSB like open water more so. I have not seen any of my big ones sense Easter... I am sure at 2 plus years old yours have got to be close to 18 plus inches as my younger ones I've had for 1.5 years and they are all 17 plus. My first batch I put in 22 of them. My second batch you see in the pic I put in 25 and my pond is no bigger than yours.

I catch some of these guys on 1/8th ounce spinner baits, Go around your pond in more open water in about that 7 to 10 feet of water depth with a bobber about 2 feet up and a big ole shiner.... just hang on..lol I hear the Jaws music already... hehe

RC
Posted By: RC51 Re: Caught a few fish Friday night - 09/21/17 12:40 PM
Ok Setter I seen in another post you feed and you have waaaaaay to many fish and you have 25 HSB. They are probably fat and sassy man. Hard sometimes to catch fish that are full all the time... lol Good Luck and hope your fish stay upright!!!

P.S.


My first air system only costs me about 400 bucks just fyi. You don't have to spend 2K on a system....with a little DIY grease...

RC
Posted By: TheBeard Re: Caught a few fish Friday night - 09/22/17 01:30 AM
+1 on the economical aeration. I got a used Thomas 2660 on ebay. $100. I got 200ft of weighted tubing, a couple diffusers and plugged it in. Boom. Bubbly. I do have power by the pond though.....
Posted By: SetterGuy Re: Caught a few fish Friday night - 09/22/17 04:42 PM
Originally Posted By: RC51
Setter how many did you stock? Do you feed them? If so do you ever see them hitting the surface for food? You can tell when they hit it sounds like someone just did a canon ball off the dock... lol

They are there I bet. Remember HSB like open water more so. I have not seen any of my big ones sense Easter... I am sure at 2 plus years old yours have got to be close to 18 plus inches as my younger ones I've had for 1.5 years and they are all 17 plus. My first batch I put in 22 of them. My second batch you see in the pic I put in 25 and my pond is no bigger than yours.

I catch some of these guys on 1/8th ounce spinner baits, Go around your pond in more open water in about that 7 to 10 feet of water depth with a bobber about 2 feet up and a big ole shiner.... just hang on..lol I hear the Jaws music already... hehe

RC

RC, I stocked them on 10/10/15. Put in 15 in the 4-6" range, and 10 in the 6-8" range. I didnt see how those lengths were arrived at.. They all appeared healthy. Haven't seen any since. I still have lots of FHM that were stocked late in 2014. Plus lots of other recruitment from GSH, HBG, RES, and "possibly" YP. I guess the HSB are stuffing themselves. I've tried everything, at every depth. None landed. I have had a few hard hits that got off right away. Those could have been HSB.. The GSH are hitting small jigs, I catch them frequently. I'll throw one out under a bobber, and try again.
Posted By: SetterGuy Re: Caught a few fish Friday night - 09/22/17 04:46 PM
Originally Posted By: RC51
Ok Setter I seen in another post you feed and you have waaaaaay to many fish and you have 25 HSB. They are probably fat and sassy man. Hard sometimes to catch fish that are full all the time... lol Good Luck and hope your fish stay upright!!!

P.S.


My first air system only costs me about 400 bucks just fyi. You don't have to spend 2K on a system....with a little DIY grease...

RC


I'm 300 yards from the barn, and electricity. That's the biggest obstacle. I'm not sure I want a pump here at the barn. It'd be right outside my bedroom, running all night. Once retired in a few years, I'll check into renting a ditcher. It's either that or solar. (And the pond is surrounded by trees.
Posted By: RC51 Re: Caught a few fish Friday night - 09/22/17 08:43 PM
Yeah you don't have to go very deep with the wire either if you have the all weather wire. If it's pretty much a straight shot from garage to pond you could get by with one of those walk behind ditch witches that go 2 feet deep. Heck you only need to go 8 to 10 inches for the wire and cover it back up. I went 110 feet with my wire used the back of a hammer claw... ha that sucked... it was 94 degrees out also.. I must have been nuts!!! LOL...

Keep us posted buddy,

RC
Posted By: canyoncreek Re: Caught a few fish Friday night - 09/22/17 10:11 PM
cheaper to run 300 yards of air line than 300 yards of all weather electric line. Keep the electric in the barn with the compressor. Air line doesn't have to be buried much below surface especially if you have a downhill grade.
Posted By: SetterGuy Re: Caught a few fish Friday night - 09/23/17 01:02 AM
I've got to go through a pretty big ravine, Overall pond is a little below the barn. It's down, then up, then back down again. Not that rocky, but some rocks in the soil. I've got a few years to think about it.
Hopefully in the next two years, I'll see one of my elusive HSB.. wink
Posted By: canyoncreek Re: Caught a few fish Friday night - 09/23/17 03:53 PM
I see now, that makes sense. If you are up and down a ravine then it might even be better to do an 'overhead' wire strung say 7-8' up to avoid animals getting tangled in it?
Posted By: SetterGuy Re: Caught a few fish Friday night - 09/24/17 11:04 AM
Hmmm. I hadn't thought about that. I would be going through the timber though, which would make it hard to notice the wire, which is a plus, but with years of off and on again drought, there's a lot of dead trees coming down, that's not too good.
Posted By: TGW1 Re: Caught a few fish Friday night - 09/24/17 12:03 PM
If concerned about the noise and considering the distance to the pond. I would suggest (based on the noise of my two Kasco pumps) I would run some elec to a new small built shed or something like a well house (away from the bedroom window) where I would put the pump and then run rolled tubing to the pond. Cost for a real small well house I think would still be cheaper than elec line run to the pond. Or at least something to look at for comparing cost.
Posted By: esshup Re: Caught a few fish Friday night - 09/24/17 03:49 PM
I think the quietest pumps are the rotary vane pumps...
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