Pond Boss

If you’ve been on this Forum for at least a few months, you’ve probably read about the alleged terrible acid conditions in East Texas ponds. One post even tried to convince a really great guy that he should not move to East Texas because of that acid and the known fact that you simply can not grow good fish under those conditions.

In the few years I’ve been reading this Forum, I’ve seen only three pictures of 10 pound class LMB posted that were fish raised in ponds….not coincidentally two of those pictures came from East Texas (and both were from Tilapia stocked ponds).

The fish pictured below was caught this evening from one of my East Texas ponds. It was only 7 pounds on the Boga, but I think it is worthy of a picture and comment because of those past threads. This fish had a whopping relative weight over 1.2. In another year or two, it will join the ranks of the other 10 pound class fish that came from this same pond.

Water temp 68 degrees, ph 7.0, and visibility about 9 inches. Pond treated with ag. lime 5 years ago and absolutely nothing since then.

Don’t move to East Texas. The ponds there are all filled with acid water that won’t grow fish.

Beautiful fish, ML! I love the dark green coloration despite the 9" visibility.

East Texas may be acidic, but south Texas has some MUDDY ponds. You pick your poison either way, I suppose. You should be very proud...that is a nice fish anywhere!

Nice bucketmouth, ML! I can only hope the water in Grimes county is as acidic as yours. :p

I'll take a double order of some of them! Nice.

Don't worry guys that acid water goes all the way from Georgia to East Texas and none of us can grow nice fish. :rolleyes:

Yeah, right!

I think I am the guy that ML just took a shot at, for advising a person “starting from scratch”, to seek OPTIMUM water quality.

Certainly we all deal with marginal situations in our lives on a daily basis , that we deal with successfully.

Congratulations ML – Nice fish...

George Glazener

Nice fish and congratulations.

You know, Lake Fork has always been a pretty fair East Texas bass lake.

Dave, from a geologic standpoint, major reservoirs are not a good example of local water quality.

Lake Toledo Bend, an East Texas Lake, has it’s headwaters in the alkaline Cretaceous carbonate rocks, whereas lake Fork's headwaters are transitional Cretaceous/Tertiary, and marginal alkaline...

Nice fish from any pond, ML. My question is that the bass appears to be in pre-spawn condition. Are weights of female bass adjusted or compensated for when taken just prior to spawn?

That makes perfect sense, george; the big reservoirs have too much water in them for it to be all (or even mostly) local water.

Cretaceous, Tertius - I thought maybe you were gonna mention the Jackass period.

Faw,

I believe that fish is a post-spawn LMB....but I could be wrong. I know for certain, the LMB in my ponds spawned several weeks ago. She may be a late bloomer, but I don't think so because she showed the typical loose stomach skin of a recently spawned bass. I'll offer the below picture for your consideration. By my quick measurements she was 21.5 inches and a good 7 pounds and very quickly returned to the pond to grow some more.

Very nice Meadowlark!!!

Out of curiousity, what is your pond record? Was this fish in the same pond as your trout? Is that a Florida, Northern or cross?

I won't be stocking bass until next summer, but one of these years, I hope to grow a few just like yours!!!!

Thanks,
Eddie

Very nice ML. What's his/her name?

I love it when people say something can't be done! It only makes me try harder to prove them wrong!

I talked about this topic somewhat at the Pond Boss Conference with the guy that writes for In-Fisherman. (Sorry I forgot his name!) In Massachusetts where I lived as a kid, the locals catch bass that dwarf our Indiana bass even though their water is somewhat acidic, less fertile, and they are farther north than our Indiana waters. In fact, although not the norm their state record is over 15 lbs.! It seems there are other factors involved and I believe it has to do with forage. I was told that state record fish was taken in pond that connects to the sea and has periodic alwive runs (wasn't actually caught where it's listed as) and that body of water produces a few double digit bass every few years. Additionally, bluegills are considered trash fish up there, and there are lots of medium size to larger bluegills that are unexploited unlike in Indiana where they are pressured really, really, hard. We don't even have a bag limit on them. I'm thinking there is no shortage of the size bluegills that anglers normally exploit that are perfect forage size for this behemoths.

And thirdly, trout stocking just about every body of water -- even if it's only put and take is a big deal in Massachusetts. I have to wonder if these large bass are feeding on these 10 inch rainbows.

Great fish ML! Looks post spawn to me. I bet she was a real cow a couple of weeks ago.

Eddie,

For Nova pond the record LMB is 9.5 pounds. However, that fish was measured at just under 25 inches and weighed several days after it died and its stomach contents disappeared. Most reasonable people would agree that the same fish with a full stomach weighed right after catching would easily exceed 10 pounds. Using the relative weights from the 7 pound LMB as a ratio, the 9.5 pound bass would have exceeded 11 pounds.

For other ponds, the records are 8.5 pounds and 7 pounds, both of which were native LMB.

The 7 pound fish pictured was a cross between pure strain Florida bass from Danbury Fish Farms and my own native LMB. She was born, raised and caught in Nova pond, where the rainbows were stocked.

I fully expect you to exceed these fish, down the road a few years. If you approach pond management like you do other projects, records are going to tumble.

Davatsa,

Believe me, I am very proud of that fish...mainly because of its relative weight and the fact it was born,raised, and caught in my own pond. Thanks.

Would you believe Anna Niccole?

Heck, she scared my cows yesterday when she broke water!!

Please don't keep posting pictures of her with continous topic's trying to figure out who the daddy is.

Cecil,

There's absolutely no question in my mind that the LMB pictured has been feeding on 7 to 8 inch rainbows....just as the dead 9.5 pound LMB that I posted a picture of few months back. The tag team approach of Tilapia in summer and rainbows in winter seems to be working very well for my fish.