Just yesterday my grandson and I fished our new pond for only the second time.During the whole day we saw 3 full grown fhm floating on the pond at various times. They were every bit 3 inch long or longer. Might have died of natural causes. They still looked fresh dead. Maybe hit by birds? What I saw was kinda strange.There were about 6-8 very small fry fish maybe 1/2 inch long feeding or pecking at the dead minnow.I figured they were baby fhm but I netted them up and they had verticle stripes on them like my cnbg!! I think I have my first spawn!! But is it strange that they are trying to feed on the dead minnow? I have not seen any fry along my shorelines anywhere.

Not strange at all. Dry that fish out, grind it up, and you have fish meal. The "good stuff" that goes into the better fish feed products.

If you have no larger predators, you will see some adult FHM die of old age. FHM only live about a year and a half. If they are getting old and about to die, they slow way down and swim funny and are an easy target for predators. But if there are no predators big enough to swallow the minnow whole, it will die of old age after doing its last spawning thing and will float.

Good chance that is what you are witnessing. When my pond was relatively new, I would see FHM die of old age. Now with LMB and larger BG, never see the old ones any more floating. They get eaten as they slow down before they die.

Likely some day I would not even have FHM as they get wiped out. But I have a forage pond where I grow FHM, catch some each week by trapping, and keep adding to the main pond.

Does those verticle stripes on the tiny fish sound like cnbg to you? At least maybe some res fry? Don't think fhm fry would have verticle stripes. Also I do not have any predator fish yet. Will stock about 50 little fingerling bass in the spring. Thanks for the input on the dead minnow.

BG often show vertical stripes. RES can but I find them either absent or faint.

Here is an old thread where Shorty took some good pictures of RES fry.

Can a person stock too many RES?

Towards the bottom of the thread are the best pics.

I think mine must be cnbg. Thanks SNRUB.

`I have northern BG in main pond but got 100 what is supposed to be CNBG and put in my sediment pond last fall. The CNBG are about 4-5" the last time I saw them a month ago.

Either one will exhibit the vertical stripes, although my CNBG are in water that is not very clear and they are really washed out when I catch them and the vertical bars are not well defined. Put them in a bucket for a few minutes though and they darken up and then the bars can be seen much more easily.