A friend took a picture on his cell phone of a 6" Paddlefish that was for sale ( Richmond, In. Jacks Aquariums - $29) which I thought was waaay cool for an aquarium but just had this wild hair shoot out of my butt and had to ask, what about putting in a pond?? anyone know if that would work? Other thoughts were, since they are a Plankton eater, if your aquarium had a good filter system, would they be able to survive?? anyone know any of there characteristics?, would they stay deep in a pond and never be seen? Like they do here in the Ohio River where the occaisional one gets snagged by catfisherman or guys throwing 4 oz jigs below the dams. I have heard but never witnessed one doing this but many have told me they see them surfacing on the big river at times so if they did that in apond, that would be pretty neat.

Always trying to work my way out of the box.......8^)

Salmonid

Paddlefish require large sized zooplankton for survival. The larger sized zooplankton usually Daphnia types are not present or numerous enough in ponds with minnows, shiners, shad and or panfish including crappies because these fish feed heavily on the larger forms of zooplankton and keep them cropped way too low for the paddlefish to get enough to eat, grow, and do well enough to survive stressful winter conditions when zooplankton are often at their low annual abundance. Now if the paddle fish has been trained to eat fish food then it would be able to get enough nurishment to grow and do well enough in a pond to have a good chance of survival. Occasionaly paddlefish raised in hatcheries are trained to eat fish food. Check with pet shop to see if the fish will eat fish pellets. If yes then chances are good that it will survive and be seen regularly feeding at the surface. Feeding on pellets is quite a chore for paddlefish since their mouth is on the ventral and the fish has to turn almost 180 degrees for it to take a pellet off the surface. This is a very interesting sight if you have ever get to see it. At one time Fenders Fish hatchery in SE OH had a few pellet trained paddle fish that they obtained from a facility that was raising them in Kentucky.

We have Paddlefish, Polyodon spathula in the oxbow lakes (total acreage 15 acres). Also have both shads , crappie , BG , RES, WM , gar (3 types) , bowfin , LMB , SB and HSB , most of the catfish types , various minnows , buffalo , drum , eels , GSF and a few more I can't think of now. The Paddlefish get big ( 50 lbs +). The river does flood the lakes on average about twice a year for about 6 total days. It is a swamp system and very productive. No feeding.

Thanks, I figured it wasnt feasable in my clean pond situation but interesting to see they are pellet trainable and would do well in a swampy, full of micro stuff oxbow situation.

It was just a thought so take it easy guys....

Next question, what about rock bass?? pros/cons in a contained 3/4 acre pond system?

Salmonid

Mark, they had a paddlefish in Bass Pro Shops aquarium. They were feeding it some sort of protein slurrey. It was quite a site watching the paddlefish open it's mouth and weave in an out of the food.

Here is a link to the 144 lb. Kansas record paddlefish, my understanding is that it was caught in a 16 acre impoundment that has no river flow through.

http://www.kansasangler.com/archive/0502riley.html