I have a 4 acre lake in Northwest Georgia that was built in the early to mid 70’s. It has Bream, Crappie, Catfish, Carp and Bass in it. I just feel like the fish ratio may be off or the amount of food may be low. Ten years ago we would catch 5-10lb bass out of it, today all the bass are 2 lbs or less. I think my Bream population may be low, I walked around the whole lake for 1.5 hours with a worm last weekend and never caught a bream. What do you recommend as a first step to getting the pond back on track and producing quality fish? Should I stock bream and minnows? I am new to Pond Management, so I am looking for advice. Thanks

I'll throw my 2 cents in. You are probably WAY overstocked with bass, and you need to start keeping them. I'll let the actual # you need to keep to the pros, but guessing at least 100# per year of fish smaller than 14". Maybe more?????

If your catfish are huge they can eat everything up... you are not seeing any BG at all then it is probably a predator thing. Agree on removing bass and crappie if they are stunted

After reading again, almost a sure thing you are overstocked in crappie. Keep every crappie you catch regardless of size. Run trot line and jug lines to catch all the catfish you can.

The Catfish were stocked 6 years ago. They are just now in the 2-4 lb range. Before they were stocked we set trot lines and removed all of the big catfish that were in there. I feed the catfish a few times a week, there are no catfish above 6 lbs whatsoever. I don't know if that helps a bit. I still think its a food problem. I see a good many minnows around, but not catching any Bream last weekend threw me for a loop. I use to sit there and catch 20-40 in a day if I stayed very long. Not many people come crappie fish it, so there could be too many crappie in there.

Stock 400 native adult bluegill (5"-7") per acre and harvest 35-40 LMB 15 inches and smaller per acre. That, I am guessing, would get you off to a good start....based on my experience anyway.

I am certainly only a pondmeister in training and no expert but I would do an electro survey of your current population first. That would likely cost $750-$850 but well worth it IMO.....you ideally want to find out where you currently actually stand. My guess is the "remedy" will be at least somewhat similar to the above recommendation.

Not enough forage and too many predators. And maybe also not enough brushy cover where forage can hide. That pretty much describes where my efforts are focused of late in our BOWs. BM61.

Yeah here is what I would do. Like said above.

1. Keep all the crappie you catch even if it's coon bait. I know that sucks but you got to do something with them. Your pond really is to small for crappie but that's another whole story.

2. Any bass caught 12 to 13 inches or smaller keep it for the time being it's not gonna hurt your pond trust me.

3. Any bass caught 14 inches or bigger you need to do some RW's on. (relative weights) we have a chart here on the forum under archives that will tell you what your bass should be weight wise verses length. If you are way low in the percentage side say under 90 your bass are to many and like you said you don't have enough food for them. You need to catch several though to kinda get a feel as to where you are though you can't just go off a couple bass.

3. If you can get them you need to stock 5 to 7 inch BG. Don't bother stocking any small ones or minnows they will just get ate as soon as you put them in the pond! It would be a waste of money.

4. I imagine if you went all around the pond and did not catch a thing on a worm you are correct your food source is all but gone. Something happened. Between the crappie and the bass and the catfish your BG done stand a chance! They cant breed fast enough.

5. If you can afford it before you do anything maybe you should have a electric shock survey done that would tell you a lot about whats going on....

Minus the catfish and the crappie you could have one heck of a LMB,BG,RES, HSB pond man!! I wish I had 4 acres now that I know what I know you would never get me off the pond!!

Hey good luck and keep us posted. How about some pics?

RC

Ditto on what BM61 said had no idea he wrote that till I got done. lol

RC

[img]http://s1380.photobucket.com/user/trushing88/story[/img]

Thanks for all the great advice. I will check into an Electric Shock Survey. I'm sure there is a company close that can do this. I will fish the next few weeks and analyze the bass as you mentioned. Hopefully I can get this straightened out and start producing quality fish again soon. I posted a link to some pictures of the lake. Most are from when I was building my house, so they aren't great photos.

Trush that is a sweet looking place man!!

RC

RC51 thank you sir. My grandfather built the lake before I was even born. Now that I live on it, I want to have a place for my kids and nephews to catch good quality fish. I'm anxious to start a management plan. I've contacted a local company about helping me get off to a good start. Hopefully they will make it happen. Thanks again for your help. I will keep you all posted with results.

My learning curve on ponds is still near vertical, but hang around here, and keep asking questions and you will learn a lot.

One thing you may or may not know is your pond will only support "x pounds" of fish. So at some point, the more numbers fish you get the weight per fish will be less. The more the numbers increase the more strain on you forage fish.
If your pound will support 1600# of fish(400#/ac) you have to start figuring out what % is in Bass, crappie, and catfish. The weight won't really change just the numbers and weight per fish. Once they wipe out the forage base there isn't enough new hatch to support the fish that are there.

Looks like an awesome setup trush. Looking forward to having a cabin or something on one of our BOWs (it will happen at some point).

And as RC51 stated....keep EVERY crappie you catch even if they are tossed behind the dam. That has really helped at our place. BM61.

trush88,
Very nice.....

+1 on keeping the crappies but don't toss them behind the dam! Pickle them!

You place looks great!

I see in the last pic that there is a fence between the fire and the pond... Is the pond totally fenced?

Thanks everyone. Yes the pond is fenced, we have cows that use this for their water source and wading pool. I also have a .25 acre pond in my yard that I cleaned out while building my house. I haven't decided what I am going to do with it yet.

The small pound would be great to use as a forage Pound I don't know how many but if you put minnows and only minnows in there they can breed to the point where can trap them and release them in the main pond as a food source to Leave pressure off the gils

check with greg grimes in ballground ga. he has an electro fishing boat. he can consult and advise.

Another vote for Greg