Pond Boss Forums INTRO Questions & Observations Fish type, concern ??

GW
you are up to 1050 plus posts, i am sure i havent seen em all, thanx for showing up.

it appears to me that you have yourself your next mission

now, where you going to get your broodstock? and if it goes bad we can feed em to the BSF.

but whhat about the 1.5lbs of bg to 1.5 pounds of GSF? And then whats the fasttest way to the most 1.5 pounds of fish protein for the existing habitat and pellets?

the study clearly didnt know ole GW was hot on the trail.

Thanks cliffbrook. Any day now our pond contractor will start work on my girlfriend's pond and my .5 acre pond. As soon as there's a small amount of water in it I will begin the experiment. The only difference is that GSF aren't native to my area. That's funny isn't it? The good news is that Warmouth are native and they're plentiful. So my test will be for WM, but I think there are a lot of similarities to GSF. Hopefully my experience will help anyone interested in GSF. One encouraging fact is that the record WM is almost 2.5 lbs compared to 2.1 for GSF. My goal is a 3 pounder.

DIED, I don't know where I got the idea that you had changed to managing for LMB, I guess I was thinking of jhap. Please excuse the references to "nobody managing for trophy GSF". I stand corrected. I look forward to hearing more about your pond as things develop. Someday I hope we can compare our apples and oranges (GSF and WM).

I have read documentation of GSF taking over ponds but have not PERSONALLY seen it. The various State records of their growth potential are pretty conclusive as regards their comparison to other sunfish. However, every pond is its own ecosystem and is different.

At one time, about 25% of my catch was GSF. For awhile, I tossed them on the bank. Then I started thinking about their more cylindrical shape and figured they were the perfect bass food. Now, I seldom see or catch one. They just haven't been able to overcome time, LMB predation or BG spawning competition.

Like RES, they only spawn annually and neither provide a plentiful forage base to feed/raise other predators. As a forage base, neither are useful and yet the RES are prized for their snail eating tendency. I guess that part makes sense but I find that everything in the water is a predator of everything else and all small fish will predate on flukes. Gambusia are known for their larvae eating but anything that sees a larvae will eat it.

I still have a couple of whoppers that come to feed. If I see them when fishing, I pull the bait away from them because I hate to stress those old guys/gals. If caught, I handle and release them very carefully.

I consider them a beautiful fish and a very limited or non existant threat when stocked with LMB and BG.

BTW, my favorite dogs and people have been mutts. I kinda resemble that remark.

DIED I think we should not move this topic to the archives but instead start a GSF thread in the archives which links to this thread and others on GSF including yours. Thoughts. I will look for threads and ask Bill to write the short intro. Good idea.

DD, I have found several references to GSF spawning more than once a year.

For better or worse, the ponding world revolves around LMB. Except for a scarce few BG aficionado's. All other species are judged not so much for their own benefits, but by their compatibility and usefulness to grow big LMB. I guess that's why BG and RES have been favored without question for so long.

If the mighty LMB, SMB, or HSB aren't wanted as the top predator, then GSF and WM must be looked at in a completely different light.

I love to catch LMB, but actually think I might prefer a killer BG/GSF pond to a good BG/LMB pond, assuming the balance would be controllable and sustainable. I'll be watching your adventure closely, GW!

Good grief this thread has gone crazy in the past 24 hours! We got us a nice debate going on here.




I didn't take any remark personally Ewest, I was just poking fun as per my usual behavior.

Oh and I'm glad you mentioned the forum issue, I though it was just my computer since I haven't heard anyone else mention it.



Me confuse an issue..... well I never!!!!

archer, I highly suggest that you get a wiremesh (1/4" mesh) minnow trap with a conical opening on each end. Use a little spray paint to dull the shiney finish of the wire mesh. Shiney finish scares fish. Bait trap with bread or fish food and set the trap in shallow water (top of trap just out of or under the surface), and parallel to shore. The catch from 2-4 trappings will tell you the relative percentages of minnows and panfish. I dealt with a pond this fall that had small fish in it from a spring pumping -filling operation. Fish swimming in the shallows were schooling and swimming like minnows, thus they appeared to my trained eye to be minnows. Daughter of pondowner said she had been bit by little fish and she saw whitist yellow on one of the fish. Now I was in doubt. A trap set for just 15 minutes reveiled about 15-24 GSF. I am always learning. If you don't catch any small GSF the the adults in your pond did not spawn this year. I will look for a picture to post of small GSF and BG.


I very much doubt that birds brought in those GSF because it is almost impossible for a couple birds to bring in several GSF in one summer. One or two rare birds may bring in 1 maybe 2 fish a summer but not 4 or 5. When I was a kid 5-13 yrs old, I was an avid pond stocker. I was constantly moving fish around in buckets doing "favors" like a "professional". The main difference between me and 99% of the other fishermen-pond stockers is I knew the difference between GSF and BG; they don't. I think your pond was stocked by "friends" because you weren't doing it fast enough for them to get another place to fish.

Lots of kids catch and dissect frogs; young William Cody could dissect them and then put them back together again. Cody says "A budding plastic surgeon in the making", but he never became board certified. .

Here are pics of yoy (juvenile) BG and GSF.

BG







GSF

All I need now is a good hole in the ground and some water!

UPDATE

Fished on Weds/Thurs afternoon from about 4:45 to 6:00 pm. Caught 3 fish Weds (1 3", 1 4.5", 1 6")[was just my two kids], and caught 16 fish Thurs (10 5-6", 6 3-4") [four of us fishing]. We caught more Thurs because I set the hook depth deeper (about 2 ft below surface) since we had a cool front bring a strong north wind and 60F air temp Thurs morning. We take them to a nearby creek and let them loose (dont have the heart to kill them, especially since the kids caught them).

I was planning on building my fish trap this weekend. I have some left over wire screen (lathe) that was used to make mortar stick to the exterior walls of my house before stone was cemented to it. It has very small spacing ( < 1/8" weave), and can make about an 18" diameter, 3 ft long cylinder. I was going to roll my end openings into a cone and trim off the tip to make an entry point, then wire that to the main cylinder.

How large (diameter) should the cone tip opening be ?

Thanks for the tip on depth placement.

I would have to assume that the GSF spawned sometime this year, as my wife hooked a very small GSF (would fit inside palm).

I would like to be able to gauge the numbers of my stocked 1-3" CNBG....will they enter the trap if larger GSF are already in there? And if they do, would the GSF eat them before I saw them?

I hope that all the fish I see in the shallows are minnows, as I never saw any fish in the shallows until I stocked FHM in Oct. The pond was almost full all summer, so the shallows were easy to see, but no activity.

As for how the GSF got there I am still head scratching. On an unfed pond, I cant see GSF fry growing to 6" in 16 months, and the first 3-4 months the water was very cloudy as new bank areas became covered or washed down due to rain. Unless you were walking through fenced fields that are private property, you would not know this pond was there, and I have only 3 neighbors nearby (which means at least 300 yds apart), but can't rule out just someone trying to "help" me out. The one thing I can guarantee is that it was not from inflow...that would require 2 ft of water across 100's of acres to get above my banks.

The Lord moves in mysterious ways...........

ewest's photos are pretty good for 1.5-2.5" BG and GSF. They should give you a good indication for separating BG and GSF. CNBG will look very similar to the BG shown by J Lyons.