My wife and I are in the middle of purchasing a different house and of course on the property it has a pond It was the only must I had on my list. The pond is just north of 1/2 acre. It looks a lot more usable and little better built than my current pond.

Anyway back to the point of this post! While I was there inspecting the "home" I fed the fish off the dock, I had many catfish come to the surface I didn't see any gills or bass on my walk around the pond.

Should I fish it for a couple months and see if I can get the CC out and then stock accordingly ? ( I asked the homeowners what they have been feeding them and just nasty ole roy dog food)

The pond has a nice aerator running out in the middle. Its kidney bean shaped and in the corners in the shallows I see a lot of seaweedish looking stuff. None to the surface though. Water clarity at about 3ft. My goal for the pond is nice bluegill fishing, like monsters!! And the occasional 16-18in bass. Can it be done and how long will it take???

It sounds like you want a do-over? Are you willing to drain and nuke from orbit to get to your end goals faster?

Anything can be accomplished. It only takes time and money. You'll need to know a lot more about the situation there before you can put a plan together. But I've no doubt you can establish a great spot that meets your expectations. Will they let you fish it now?

Hollywood thats a great idea! I'm going over there for an inspection on Saturday with the sellers so Ill ask them then. Its kind of sad leaving my pond and finally starting to get some decent bass growth! I will ID the weed growing in the bottom and see if you all think I should do something or not? They had a weed rake there that was like 20ft long.

Well the pond is 15ft deep in the middle. Its .60 acres. It has been stocked with CC and bluegill. When I threw some food out there all that came up was mass amounts of CC .... Should I nuke and start over.. I really don't want that many catfish. I really want an awesome Bluegill pond with the occasional nice bass. Wondering if I could catch all the cats? I don't like the idea of "nuking" but if it got me to my goals quicker that is an option.

Read some people on here that had started over and done Hybrid Bluegill and HSB and just restocked them annually with the amount they took out. That sounds kind of interesting to me. Curious if I could mix in some red-ear or regular bluegill to this option.

The answer to your scenarios are very different. If you go CC free (kill them all) then you might be able to do a HSB, HBG but would then have to plan for who your new apex predator will be. Obviously you probably would not go back down the road of using CC as a apex predator unless you like to eat them.

If you can't remove all the CC or choose not to, then you have to selectively kill or remove MOST of them and can't really plan any other stocking plans until you get to that point. Also while the CC are being diminished (if you do the slow removal plan) the regular bluegill are going to be populating wildly so there will be a time where you likely will have to transition over to your other apex predator.

Is a drain down and complete fish kill a possibility or do you prefer to manage what you have there first?

I would try to catch out most of the CC and then go from there. To me, it's fun to watch the CC vacuum up pellets. If you left just a few, the pond would be fine. Then you could stock some 6 inch LMB. I am cautious about Hybrid Bluegill. A neighbor's 3/4 acre pond was stocked with HBG and CC about 16 years ago and now it is overpopulated with small fish that look more like GSF than BG. The CC they stocked got big in about 10 years, but it appears now they have all disappeared.

It cannot be overstated....HBG need a predator capable of controlling recruitment, as well as a management strategy that addresses their specific requirements if their full potential is to be realized.

UPDATE!

So I have moved in and little worse than I originally thought. It is over populated to the max with Black Crappie. All i have caught minus the Cats are these little runts. The biggest one Ive caught is 3inches. Its a .60 acre pond with aerator running.

What are my options minus killing everything off.

I was thinking I go out and catch or buy some 12-14in bass and let them go buck wild?

The channel cats I think I can get rid of. Ive been feeding them and hooking them while they are eating. Not the most sporting way but it is quick. Ive caught 4 18-20in long ones, and Ive only seen about 5 more while feeding. I understand there are probably more but as long as they are not reproducing I can knock them out.

jstiz,

Your wanting the same exact pond I have now. I have a 1 acre pond with CNBG/RES/and LMB and about 30 HSB. I have are I feed about 2 to 3 seconds twice a day.

Fast forward to now. I now have 4lbs LMB, 4 lbs HSB and 1 plus pound Gills....

Your main question was how long did it take? I bought my land in 2009 just like you did not have a real clue as to what was in it. I fished the mess out of it from May till hunting season. All I had was stunted LMB 12 to 13 inches long and a bunch of GSF that's all I ever caught so I was kinda lucky in that regard. So I kept a lot of them small bass and all the small GSF.

Well I knew I could not stock baby bass or too small of bluegill casue I know I still had fish in my pond. So I got some fresh 10 inch LMB Florida strain, let them lose to eat the rest of my smaller GSF. I then stocked right near 100 6 inch CNBG so I knew my bass couldn't eat them! This was all done end of 09 and spring of 2010. So it took about 4 years to start getting decent fish, but the last 2 years have been awesome!! Here are a few pics from last year and this year. Keep in mind I did not stock the HSB till 2012. So it can be done just need a little more patience.....

RC

Here is an older thread that might have some useful information on crappie management. There are others on the forum that have caught and filleted hundreds of crappie and got their ponds under crappie control so maybe they will chime in also.

Old crappie management thread with links

He will have to use northern strain LMB, Florida strain won't do well where he's at.

The big cats aren't hurting, they are helping by eating the smaller crappies. The crappies are probably eating a lot of the baby cats if they do pull off a successful spawn. BUT, if you do catch a cat, don't put it back, keep it out. It will only hurt you in the upcoming years.

So, without pushing the reset button, I would stock 50-60 12" LMB and let them eat their hearts out. At the same time, I would fish every spare minute for the crappie and toss 'em out for coon food.

Keep tabs on the relative weight of the LMB that you stock. Before stocking, get a good idea of what that number is. Then as you catch them as you are catching crappie, weigh and measure them. With that much forage in there, I would expect them to gain length and weight fast. Once that growth starts slowing down, you should see a large reduction in the number of crappies. Then and only then would I introduce BG and RES. Unfortunately, they will have to be advanced sizes.

BUT, if you stock 4"-5" BG/RES now, and they reproduce, that will take pressure off the crappies as the LMB will feed on them too.

+1

So pretty cool update.

First I added 2 more spruce trees to one finger of the pond for cover.

July 1st I had the following delivered into our pond

25 4in LMB
75 BG at 3-4in
2 12in Grass Carps
5lbs of fathead minnows dropped into the spruce trees.

This week I went fishing for the first time since then. With 4 cast past the spruce trees, I caught 4 LMB I should of weighed them but these suckers were fat! I was really worried that I bought expensive fish food for the catfish but it looks like the LMB at least survived.

I will update with weight once I catch another.

Its sad I haven't been fishing for over a month but I'm in the middle of converting our entire house over to solar...