Has anyone got experience with spawning disks? I have made some n want to get advice on them.
Thanks.
Spawning disks. What fish are they intended for? No doubt there are various things that can be labeled spawning disks. Any examples you can show what you mean or their intended use?
Concave circular 20". For Bass or Bluegill . Suppose to increase survival 3-400%
maybe a picture would help or more details.
I can't get a picture to paste in here correctly. So here's a link to what they are.
http://cdn-js.pondking.com/wp-content/uploads/2015/09/SpawningDiscInstructions.pdf
I have looked at buying some this year also.
Do these actually work and get used by panfish? I've seen some bluegills spawn is some very mucky bottoms and it never seems to be a problem...heck sometimes it appears that they purposely seek out soft bottom areas mentioned in the PDF
I'd like to see these in use before spending any time or money
Promotional advertising can slant or bias the information in just about any direction. These spawn disks are just small one nest size areas with gravel instead of the more common larger bottom shallow 1-4ft deep "beach" areas with sand, gravel, stoney, or somewhat firm bottom covered with thin layers of organics. BG-LMB nest preparation involves aggressively cleaning the fluffy material from the nest area. Larger pieces are even sometimes moved by mouth. IMO the pictured disks are most beneficial in ponds with lots of thick deep organic muck or very deep steep sided quarries that have a lack of shallow water areas for sunfish-bass spawning. Prolific BG will make nests and spawn on any fairly firm relatively flat surface even hard compacted clay.
Kids snow saucer sledding disks may be cheaper. Wooden shallow tray boxes built from pallets would be another low cost time involved option.
Because BG spawn in colonies ( like 50 beds)you would need a bunch of those pictured. Not needed in my opinion except in unusual circumstances like Bill mentioned. For other species it might help but may not be needed. It is much easier to aid in survival post hatch if needed. Clay or gravel will do just fine.
It is not clear to me when I looked at the link to the disks if you add gravel or leave them empty. At first, I thought add gravel but then it says if you aren't staking them down you need to add 2 pounds of weight. If they are full of gravel, why would you need to add weight?
The website photos that show the discs lead me to believe that the product is made of roto-molded polyethylene which has about the same specific gravity of water. So...they may float, they may sink, they may just hang out in between. I bet you are supposed to add weight beneath the disc and I can't help to think that if you were to put gravel on top of the discs that the fish would clean it back out.
I made 2 of these and sunk them with cement blocks under them . I made them from 26" diameter drip
pans
http://www.homedepot.com/catalog/productImages/1000/40/40030e11-cc7c-4293-9aed-76e7bb5efeff_1000.jpg