Pond Boss Forums STOCKING A NEW POND Creating the food chain I don't think I have any fish!

Well, it's been a couple months now since our purchase in late December. The neighbors warned me that while the house was in foreclosure for about 6 months, the locals fished the pond out.

Previous to that, they said the frequently caught hand-sized bluegills, 10" bass, and a 8lbs channel cat. They said fish weren't big but were abundant....usually catching one on the first cast.

Well, I've fished it at least a dozen times now throwing everything from small grubs, beetle spins, crank baits, plastic worms, crappie jigs, etc, etc...even minnows on a hook. Not so much as a sniff. I haven't had the first bite.

I did set out a minnow trap and have caught 6-7 small 1 inch blue gill. I see a LOT of minnow fry in the water (haven't caught them in the trap yet).

I really don't want to drain the lake...that's pretty drastic for me. I did find a local company that does electric shocking to survey the living fish in the pond. Does anyone know what they may charge to do this (ballpark)? I haven't contacted them yet. The pond is only about 3/4 acre and 1/2 of it is only about 2-3 feet deep so if there are fish, they shouldn't have a hard time tracking them down.

"Cool" situation you have there Ego. I will follow this with interest. In my initial opinion, an electro-survey (and Shawn Bank's services are very reasonable) might be the way to go. If all you can find are tiny forage fish, you might have larger fish too satisfied to chase what you've been offering. Could be wrong though. What are your goals for this BOW?

My goal is just to have a place to catch some fish after a hard day of work. I'm really not interested in growing trophy sized large mouth. I would be perfectly fine with 1-3lbs bass and chunky bluegills. I actually prefer quantity of fish caught in one session to quality.

I'll probably set up the electro survey guys sometime this upcoming week.

I'll bet they didn't/couldn't eliminate the fish. I expect they are actually negatively conditioned by high fishing pressure.

Get a 3 inch bluegill and use it for bait with 6 pound or smaller test line.

I agree with Dave D.

I don't know what your water temps are down south, but the bluegill and bass are extremely sluggish in my pond until the water gets at least into the 60s, and preferably the 70s. I usually don't start catching any until sometime in April.

And then, sometimes the fish just go on vacation. This is kind of a humorous story from last weekend when 2200 people showed up for a fishing contest, but the fish refused to cooperate.
Thousands Compete in Fishless Tournament.

Try live bait. Under a bobber, back to the basics. Worm or cricket. I can catch a fish on bluegill in my pond but I think when they see a cricket or worm it's like a dessert/change from normal..

Hey EGO how deep's the other half? Whats the water temp? 45-50? Its hard but not impossible to catch all the catchable fish out of a pond this small....depends on the talent and determination of the catchers. If it was me I'd wait until the water was in the high 50's low 60's for a week then fish it hard with the same stuff you mentioned. If still no good you can buy more 6" LMB than you need for this pond and have enough money left over to buy a few bags of good feed for the brim and still come out cheaper than paying for shocking thats going to tell you what a bare hook does for free. Maybe you could post a pic of one of those small "brim" and one of the guys here could ID it for you. Congrats on the new place and Good Luck!!!
EDIT I JUST REREAD YOUR POST AND NOTICED THE CC...THAT COULD BE A REAL PROBLEM AND IF THERE ARE A HANDFUL OF 8+LBERS THEN MY LMB STOCKING ADVISE WOULD TURN OUT TO BE A BIGGER WASTE OF MONEY......MAYBE...I DUNNO...ALL DEPENDS? ANYWAY WAIT 2-3 WEEKS...SEE WHAT YOU CATCH...GO FROM THERE.

Hey guys. Appreciate the feedback.

Water temps at the lake are low 50's right now. We're getting a warm streak here this week of 70 degree days so it should come up here soon.

Today we spent a lot of labor on the pond....cleaning up the scrub brush, briars, and 2-4 year old pine trees around it. Never seen so many briars in my life.

We are fortunate to have great neighbors who happen to own a landscaping business....which means they have a bobcat loader and cheap labor.

I'll post some pics in a few once they upload. I was pretty disappointed though...typically in my experience with weedeating and chopping around lake edges, bluegills atleast get some insect snacks.....but didn't see the first top water activity and it was a 70 degree day today. I know it's still February and water temp is pretty cool still so......

findfoolfight, I think my side of the pond ranges from about 4' to 8' with the neighbors half ranging from 4' to 1'....I should be able to see any fish spawning in their half in the next 60 days or so.

Ego,

If it was my pond, I think I'd wait to make any judgments until the water reaches at least 65 degrees for several days. At that point you could start tossing in a handful of floating fish food each evening just before sundown. If the water has been at least 65 degrees, 2-3 feet down for several days, and after a week of tossing in a handful of food each evening and no fish show up, then I'd start to panic. Until then, I'd keep doing pond maintenance. Once the fish start biting, you won't want to spend the time on those kind of mundane chores.

Good luck and keep us informed.
Ken

I wouldn't panic at all if it is empty.. I'd consider myself very lucky to have a new pond that I can stok and manage exactly how I want it.. If you do get low numbers I would honestly consider a fresh start, what the heck why not new house new pond grow together..

Just got done uploading pics from yesterday. The perks of having a landscaper as a neighbor.

Work in progress:



Across the pond before:


Across the pond work in progress:




Toward house BEFORE pic



Toward house AFTER:



Dam BEFORE




Dam After:




More after pics:





And as promised, here's a sample of the booming fishery....sigh

Nosey pal...literally

Them Fish look good.. If their in there that size their in there bigger too.. And did you cut down a big cypress in your towards house view.. I woulda left the tree coulda put a dock next to it for some shade.. Pond looks amazing after the clean up..

The big tree you see in the corner is actually an oak tree and yes, we kept it for shade.

The pond is looking good! Those are BG in your hand. (at least that's my WAG. )

Couple more pics. These don't really do it justice though.

Our "before" view of the pond from the deck on the backside of the house was really obstructed by scrub brush and undergrowth.




Today was my "grand reveal" to myself, waking up to snap a photo from the deck. I love how wide open it is right now - very peaceful.




Now if we can just get some fish in there, this place will be good to go

You are at a crossroads. Decisions and planning. Nice place with potential. Work with existing pond or renovate and start over.
I would serioiusly consider or explore renovating PRIMARILY because of your pond's expanse of shallow water for 3/4 ac. In the renovation I would drain it down to low pool or drain completely to increase the maximyum depth to 10'12' and/or deepen the edges where all your weed/algae problems will occur. Weed algae problems are usually minimal during winter conditions. With all that shallow water of 2'-3.5' you will constantly fight weeds in warm weather esp if you feed the fish or with fertilization which ideally results in water visibilities/ transpariences of 18"-2'. Surface light can penetrate twice the secchi disk depths of 18"-2' for bottom weed growth. You have a lot of adjacent trees which will add lots of bulky organics to the pond which causes problems esp in shallow water. Get some estimates to dip, scoop or push out a lot of the OLD slop. The cost may not be a whole lot more than a good electro-shocking survey w/ written report. Or at least that money will help defray the renovation costs. IMO pond basin reshaping should cost around $4-$8K. If you don't renovate now when fishery is low quality, you may not be as willing to do it when pond has better and larger fish. Pond basin renovation will need to be done sooner or later. So if not now put it in your long term capital appropriations.

A drain to low pool will allow deepening of edges and mid depths and save the existing fish but will not allow increasing the maximum depth. Draining to low pool will also make it cheaper andmore efficient to kill off the existing fish with rotenone. I'm not sure that the value of existing fish is worth saving. Plus either way it will take some TIME to rebuild the fishery. Renovation first rebuilds the fishery in a morphologicially sound pond with adequate depth with fewer reoccurrring and continual weed/algae, shallow water, induced headaches. Long term chemical costs and efforts to fight excess weeds is also concern to consider if you do not renovate.

Wow, great before and after photos. I love the view from your deck!

Those small fish in the picture looked like pure strain BG. I suspect most of the small fish that you are seeing were also small BG and some may well be smaller than those in the picture. Their numbers will tend toincrease dramatically this year if the LMB have been heavily harvested which they probably were by previous owners and 'friends'.

Hey guys, thanks for the input.

Yesterday I went down to the pond and just sat down on the edge and watched. Typically when I walk up to the edge the minnows scatter....but if you stay still for 5 mins they come back.

Yesterday I literally watched a constant stream of small fish flow from right to left 1-2 feet out from the shore line where I was sitting.

As I got a better look at them, I realize they are not minnows, they are very small bluegill. I'm talking 1" bluegill. Also mixed in where small bass...2-4" bass. They were easy to tell apart from the bluegill from the black stripe on the tail and their erratic swimming style compared to the bluegill...almost like they were herding the bluegill.

What baffles me is that these fish look like this year's fry. They are that small and that plentiful...they're schooled up like newly born fish fry.....I'm baffled b/c they look like 1-3 month old fish but that's too early for fish to spawn, yet the fish look too small to be last year's class.

What you guys think?

The fish will almost always school according to size, not time of hatching. One hatch will have a wide range of sizes very quickly and I am sure they are from a late season spawn last year. Very little growth occurs over the winter.

I'm about to go peruse some old threads for suggestions on fish food to get these little guys started on a schedule and also start looking at places to buy 6" bass. Anyone know a place with either in the Atlanta area?

Contact Greg Grimes at Lakework. Ball Ground / Atlanta GA

greg@lakework.com

http://www.lakework.com

I'd look at the Purina Mills website, look up AquaMax, then look for local dealers and let your fingers do the walking. Get a bag of 500 and start feeding a small bit once the water temp gets into the low 60°F's.

Size 500 Aquamax is a little big for the size off fish in the picture. Before buying any food I would do a good angling - trapping survey to get a good idea what sizes of fish are in the pond. IMO with a pond that shallow a seine about 50ft long or a few fish traps would be a good investment.