I have a 6 acre pond that is about 5 1/2 years old.This year we are catching alot of crappie in the 6-10 inch size,last year we caught maybe 10 all year.To date this year we have caught about 35.The problem is we had to fill this pond with a water well due to it has a levee around all four sides,so the only water it gets is threw the well.We live on the property and have been managing this pond for largemouth and bream fishing.Could someone please tell me how these fish got in my pond.

Most likely "helpful" friends, neighbors, relatives, or poachers.

I would say you better do a lot of crappie fishing before the spawn.

Theo,Probably not the case here,My pond is in my back yard with my office over looking the lake.We live in the middle of 327 acres with our house and my office over looking the lake.I do not think i've had poachers are friends come fish in the lake with me looking out the window.Any other idea's?How about the hundred's of wild ducks that fly in and out of the lake.

Might have been with the initial stocking. Species get mixed all the time at fish farms.

I was thinking the same.. just a few mixed in with the sunfish. One successful spawner is all you need.

I have them in my pond. I keep everyone I catch. At first I paniced and thought it was the end of the world but they dont see to mess up anything, but I do take every one no matter what size it is.

Steve, don't let anybody tell you that the stork brought them. Not a chance.

aw shucks dave

there was another recent post somewhere here about a cranberry bog and thunderstorms and stuff......maybe crappie fell from the sky during a hurricane.

but i think i like the "contaminanted" first stocking theory the best.

Thanks for the idead's,still does not clearly answer my question.My problem with the stocking is why did it take 5 years and 8 months to show up.Just does not seem correct to me.You would have to think we would have caught at least one in all this time.It would be different if we did not live on the property.This pond is within my sight all day.

If the pond was stocked 5 years ago, and there were five or six age-0 crappie hidden in that original stocking, they might not have reached sexual maturity until two years ago.

If those fish spawned in 2005, then they would start to show up in the creel about now.

It would have been very easy for a half dozen adult crappie to hide in a 6-acre pond.

What are you catching them on? They are probably already starting to stunt. You will need to add and protect for spawning, quite a few golden shiners and another minnow family. Too late to get rid of them. May as well try and manage for them.

Having grown up in Northern Wisconsin and Northern Minnesota, there were thousands of small lakes that all had fish in them by the time the white man arrived. Most are not connected to other bodies of water. The wisdom of the old timers was that they were "stocked" by eggs stuck to waterfowl. How did they get stocked?

Ken

Steve M,

There are several "natural" ways for fish to get into a pond, and all have been mentioned. The odds of fish getting into a pond by some of the methods are slim, and some are very slim. Yet people do hit lotteries and jackpots on the slot machines. Think of it as pulling a slot machine lever 5-10 times a day for 5 years. Sooner or later, something will happen. It may take 20 years, 10 years, or less than 5 years, but it will happen. Nature (and man!)always finds a way!

I have a very small pond(envious of what you described sound like paradise)and I made the mistake of stocking 6 adult crappie. Now I have a pond full of thousands of baby crappie that I must knock down with adult bass. I wish my other fish were as proficient as the crappie and they compete directly with your bass and other fish. I am new at this but get rid of the crappie!

My pond is of similar size, and I find that early in the year is the best time to put a big dent in the crappie population.

I can find the majority of my crappie schooled up at a few depths around certain structure, mostly structure that is in 5-10' of water. For my pond, the sunken X-mas trees are best.

Live bait and you can clean up.

I've been doing that for about (3) years now (post finding Pond Boss), and have seen a dramatic increase in the size of my crappie. I've also been adding hundreds of pounds of fatheads and shiners, so that's had an effect also.

I was fishing at my FIL's 1/2 acre pond this past sunday and caught 8 very nice sized crappie on minnows. It was great fun and had me seriously contemplating stocking my pond with crappie. Everyone says no, but the temptation is there.

The subject of crappie has been brought up many different times. I still don't understand why they cause such a problem in the South but don't up here in the North.

At the Pond Boss convention, we were told how to handle the problem with crappie without their name even being brought up. It was in the discussion about using female LMB only. The problem with crappie is their erratic spawning and the fact that they spawn sooner than LMB. A pond of an acre or less can't hold many LMB. Manage the prey population using nonreproducing female LMB. When you see a crappie boom, stock enough female LMB to knock the crappie population down to where you want it. Overstock the LMB and make sure they are big enough to eat your small crappie. When you have the crappie population where you want it, you can reduce the LMB numbers.

Does this make sense to anyone?

I think it makes a lot of sense, Norm. If your goal is crappie and you don't want much LMB recruitment, then I think your idea would work very well for a pond owner who could stay on top of fish sizes and numbers.

The only problem I see is that when you want LMB AND crappie in a smaller pond and want both to reproduce, the juggling act of predators gets tougher. Stocking only adult LMB, not to mention only females, could also be a tough chore in some areas.

All that being said, you may be on to something. I think if someone has a smaller pond they would like to devote to crappie (with a few good-sized female LMB for fun), they could to tremendous things with your idea.

It might be a lot easier to manipulate HSB numbers for crappie adjustment.

In my pond, early in the year when the water is still cold, you can see the black crappie schooled up on various pieces of sunken structure.

At those times, you can catch most every crappie in that spot if you want to.

I think that taking advantage of this opportunity early each year has a substantial impact on keeping the crappie population in check.

I need to get my butt up to my pond very soon.

Good point, Theo. Not only are HSB voracious feeders, you can be virtually sure of no reproduction. Even with all supposed "female" LMB, I would be more leery of recruitment than with the HSB.

We're actually thinking of having our next pond devoted to crappie and HSB. If nothing else, it should be interesting and much more unique than our other ponds. The beautiful thing about those two fish is that they both like fairly open, deeper water. Some structure for the crappie, of course, but I think a deep, open pond would complement both species well and allow the HSB to get fat and happy in helping control the crappie numbers. What do y'all think?

As time passes, I am more and more convinced that our HSB have controlled recruitment of BG as well as LMB.
No small tilapia observed as well.

Last year I could not trap or catch any BG under ~5 inches or LMB under ~15 inches.
I’ll do more trapping this spring to convince myself, but with this year’s 5-year-old HSB crop, with annual stocking “ladders”, I believe the overpopulation problem of BG and LMB has been solved.
We’ll see.

We are producing CNBG over 11 inches and approaching ~ 1.5 lbs.
Don’t know why it won’t work with crappie.


N.E. Texas

Intriguing. Any forage species?

George the reason you don't see small CNBG in your pond is with its fertility the CNBG only stay that small about 2 weeks.

Crappie are different. See Crappie Pond http://www.pondboss.com/ubb/ultimatebb.php?ubb=get_topic;f=5;t=000461

In that series of threads it is discussed in great detail. Not only do they have unpredictable population swings they exhibit cyclical growth. In terms of them being a forage base that means in some years there will be little for LMB or HSB to eat absent feeding.

David I would suggest if you try a HSB and crappie pond you will have to feed and track the crappie growth cycle with the idea on some years you will have to add forage (FH , tilapia, minnows , TShad). In fact a standing crop of TShad would be great for both crappie and HSB. I would like to see what happens and if I can help in the planning let me know. Like Rad says - If you are not living on the edge you are taking up to much room.

Theo
I'll throw in a comment until David is available. I have been using Roseys lately...LOTS of Roseys...lol But this would be the beginning forage. I am looking at shiners and tshad thereafter. Some of the area ponds have had great success with shiners. All this hinges on clearing a couple of the existing ponds close by. David will be mending fences, packing cottonseed meal and mowing today. Doubt he'll post much

edit we are even looking into a same sex crappie pond.

ewest is making a good point. With crappie, we have to control two variables. The first is crappie spawning before LMB. We can do this with larger LMB or HSB. The second problem is the erratic spawning of crappie. That means we have to have forage for those years the crappie aren't spawning. To a large extent, it doesn't matter how we do these two things, rather it is important that we DO them.

George, after having met you, I enjoy your posts even more if that was possible.

Norm, sitting around the breakfast table with you, Jerry Seibert, Todd and his dad Walter Overton, My son Stan and myself, was one on the many high lites of the conference.
Many valuable and lasting friendships made at the conference my friend.
George

My thoughts:

Crappie could have been introduced with the original stockers, and can be mature at 1 year of age and 3" in length.

Crappie could have been stocked by a "friend" or neighbor.

Crappie could have arrived from upstream or downstream.

If you are now catching intermediate size crappie you need to manage to keep crappie recruitment low, and start catching and removing the existing population. In theory, you should stock heavy with the largest shiners you can find. They may help control crappie fry. Do this quick because crappie probably already spawned and fry will be actively growing. Then the shiners will spawn soon and feed your predators. By stocking heavy, I mean 10-20 lbs per acre. Then if you think this works, after observation over time, you should stock heavy with shiners every February/March.

Also you can stock some HSBs at a rate around 25/acre to help keep crappie numbers down.

For the HSB/Crappie pond, we're thinking fatheads (or rosies) along with t-shad. I figure that t-shad school up in the open water, and the HSB should be right there waiting for them. Gambusias are always good to have around in the summer in Texas, but I won't hold my breath for them to last too long.

BG- there is a species that I love and, like Dave Davidson, that I think are the backbone of a good forage base. I just don't see them being helpful or necessary in an HSB/Crappie pond, however. At least not with the other mentioned forage. Any other suggestions for forage? We're thinking GSH as well.

Steve- We have crappie in the pond at Waelder, and I have no idea how they got there either. I'm guessing they may have been introduced with original stockers or, more likely, arrived from upstream or downstream, as Todd mentioned. Since I don't know how they got there, all I can do is get them out as best I can. If you are managing for LMB/BG, I would suggest the same.

Dave in the situation you are describing the crappie will take the place of the BG but will be harder to manage. TShad , gams and FH will be the right size for both the crappie and HSB. GShiners should be a good addition as they may well help with crappie suppression. Are you going to feed the HSB ? Stocking rates and timing will be something to think about.

I wonder if varying the feed the HSB receive could be useful in controlling those variable crappie numbers.

Years with a good crappie spawn - withhold HSB feed; HSB eat more crappie.

Years with a poor or no crappie spawn - feed the HSB.

This would give an additional control state (how rarely - thankfully - I get to use Control Theory here! ) to go with varying HSB numbers and direct reduction of crappie numbers via angling or traps(?) in the crappie equation.

Theo,

How would you know in time whether it was a good year or poor year for crappie spawn? By the time you are over-run with crappie, its probably too late to do any sigificant compensation via feeding variation on HSB.

There is some interesting data summarized on the Arkansas Pond Stockers web site regarding the variability of the spawn...showing one year almost no spawn and the very next year 40,000 for black crappie. Of course, they are touting their hybrid crappie as a solution....the data is at:

http://www.arkansaspondstockers.com/index_files/page0026.htm


The other side of the equation, as relates to HSB, is that if its a poor year, i.e. no crappie spawn, the HSB still need to eat and they are voracious feeders. If you don't care about other fish in the pond, e.g. LMB or forage for LMB, then it probably doesn't matter, but if you are after a diverse pond, be careful about unanticipated impacts to other fish. I'm still toying with the thought of giving it (a crappie pond) a try, but everytime I go through the logic, it comes out the same...just isn't practical for me.

I don't know how you'd know early enough either, ML. You would need some sort of crappie early warning system. VERY good observational capabilities very early in the year.

Very good discussions. Another thought. Withold or reduce feeding HSB at a time when the new crappie should be reaching snack size. At some predetermined time later, monitor HSB angling aggression using a crappie shaped and sized lure. Keep tabs on Wr of HSB. It may take a few yrs. to get it just right, but we're discussing theory here, anyway. Whadayathink?

Crappie can be sampled very easily with a small mesh long-handle dip net, a very low cost tool. This time of the year it is easy to reach out and scoop along a pond bank to catch fry, as they will be feeding in very shallow water. Then one must be able to identify small crappie. I should have some crappie fry about now. Maybe I'll try to get some pics.

Also, remember, small crappie are good forage for large crappie AND HSBs. So a good crappie spawn isn't the end of the world, as long at the population of adult crappie and HSBs are large enough to take advantage of crappie offspring. To make this work to your advantage, stock the initial crappie after their spawning season, say late April/May. That way you don't get a quick spawn from the small initial stocker crappie, which might lead to quick problems. Still, these are theoretical predictions.

I have gone through the same exercise in my head, over and over. I don't exactly hit a wall, but there seems to be very few options. I believe things get dicey when crappie are plentiful enough to be a "feature" species, rather than just a "bonus" species that you catch occasionally. I believe the key is keeping ALL sizes of crappie in very low numbers, and in a normal size/quantity distribution. I plan on trying to keep sufficient predators to control all sizes of the crappie population. I know for sure that fishing will control the ones too large for the bass to eat.

Thanks to everyone for all of the great input. This is a fantastic thread!

Theo and ewest-
We will definitely feed when we embark upon this project. I think that is essential for HSB, given the unpredictable nature of crappie spawning. This would also take a little heat off our forage base. On the other hand, Theo and burgermeister have great ideas. I think withholding feed depending on crappie recruitment in a given spring or when the yoy are great snacking size could really help maintain a balance. I'm sure we'll have to do some supplemental stocking of HSB until we find the right balance. Having no recruitment with HSB is tough on one hand, since we'll have to maintain their numbers for them. But the flipside of no HSB recruitment is that crappie will be the only predator capable of reproduction. I think that increases our odds of actually making it work.

Bobad- I am with you on your "feature species" analysis. Let's just say that ever since I've read PB, crappie have regretted it. However, I think we'll take a chance on them this time. Even in a pond smaller than you'd normally see crappie, I think they can be a feature fish, given that no LMB/BG would be present.

I guess we're just looking for something "different." As much as I love LMB/BG/CCs, I think it would be a blast to have a unique pond with unique species. A HSB/crappie pond could provide an alternative angling challenge for family and friends. Besides, having crappie will "force" us to use angling pressure to keep the numbers down. It's a nasty chore and crappie taste awful, but someone's gotta do it.
If nothing else, we'll learn a lot.

Shad should definitely be in the mix. IMHO. Their numbers, later in the summer, will be inversely related to the crappie spawning success.

good luck, keep us 'posted'.

I posted this some tme ago, but will repeat it here. I discovered a simple way to catch more crappie than you would think possible; this is assuming you have an areation system. Any small simple plastic jig of any color just kills the crappie from sundown until it is pitch black by throwing the bait along the egdes and even directly through the column of bubbles and slowily retreiving it with a small jerking motion. I use 4 lb mono on an ultra-light rod. Last night I caught 25 in 1/2 hour. Last year my wife and I caught and counted just over 1000...no fish story here! We logged them after each trip down to thhe lake. I catch most off the deepest diffusers, and usually fish two diffusers per evening. I then wait a week or so before I hit the same diffusers again. Our best night was two years ago when three of us took in 115 in one evening! Hope this helps, JB
BTW, large bass sometimes surprise you and snap your 4 lb test!

That's not surprising to me.

I have found that crappie love to hang around overflow pipes and spillways... anything that makes current or noise. If I get overrun with small crappie, I guess I'll have to set up aeration.

I also believe that noise, current, and an inflow of water stimulates them to spawn.