I fished in my new pond for the first time the other day and discovered there were already some BG present. I'm wanting to stock the pond with YP and SM and from what I've read the BG need to be removed. I was looking into trying to drain and rotenone it, however its fed by an ephemeral stream and also drains into a creek right below regularly so I'm guessing that might be an issue. I'm thinking the simplest option would be to just try to catch or trap all the BG out since the pond is only around a 1/10 acre. Would it ruin my future fishery if I didn't get every single BG out of the pond? Thanks in advance for any suggestions

Freg, I think it would be difficult to control BG population with SM as predators.

Hi Freg. Since you have not gotten many hits on your thread, I thought I give you my 2 cents.

Your pond, being small, is relatively manageable. Consider nuking it with hydrated lime. There are good threads on PondBoss for info. Ask Rainman, or other experts directly.

I suppose you could lime it as it is. Or you could draw it down effectively with a siphon and/or a pump. If necessary, you could divert or temporarily dam up the incoming ephemeral stream if it were running when you chose to do the nuking.

I haven't use the hydrated lime, but from what I understand, using it requires no special license to do so. Application of rotenone does.

Trapping and netting is not likely to be 100% effective for removing those unwanted BG.

As I said, only worth 2 cents. Keep us posted.

Roger

I have to ask..."how did the BG get there?" If they were not stocked then they managed to get there on their own and will likely do it again.

I would assume a previous owner stocked them. Fortunately that's all I've caught and trapped so far.

u want small mouth in a /10th acre pond? lol thats like 40 feet across or so a pond that small id only put bg or channels tbh a pond that small is for bait or eating not for sport fishing

I think about 20 to 25 6 inch channel cats would be my choice.

Hey Matt, you might be surprised what you can raise in a 60'X70' pond if set up and managed properly!

Truth

I'd be leery of setting up a reproducing population of predator fish in a 1/10 ac pond. Managing bass population in my 2.2 ac pond is already a headache.

Consider instead pellet feeding fish of low reproductive capacity. Channel cats come to mind. Maybe a mix of channel cats and hybrid striped bass? I don't know enough about HSB to say if they'd do okay in small waters.

HSB , HBG and FH with feeding.

Freg, Here is a link to my newbie success story with HSB, HBG, RES, and a FHM start in case your up to feeding and ladder stocking...

http://forums.pondboss.com/ubbthreads.php?ubb=showflat&Main=38025&Number=494998#Post494998

You have to be concerned with small pond that it does not get over-fished, even if it's catch and release. They say that fish will get hook shy and HSB do not like to be caught in the heat of summer.

I hope to develop a real nice panfish pond and the HSB are there for HBG reproduction control. They are a nice bonus fish to catch on occasion, they fight like crazy! If I can get HBG over a pound and a half, I'll be a happy camper and anything more would be great.

As far as your original question...consider completely eliminating the current populations of panfish UNLESS your feeder creek carries those fish in, then you'll always have them and need to manage accordingly.

I appreciate all of the opinions so far. It seems that the best approach would be to to kill everything off and start over, however there does not appear to be any type of drain present. If I did rent a pump and drain most of the water and apply hydrated lime, would it pollute the stream that's directly below it as the pond fills back up? There's a constant outflow of water from the pond. Also there are good number of plants and salamander like creatures swimming around that I would rather not kill if possible but it sounds like that might not be an option.

Freg If you kill off the pond could you expand it any? That would be the only reason I would kill it off if it was me. I think you could work around the fish currently in there with some creative stocking but that is just my opinion but I am no expert. Welcome to the forum.