Pond Boss Forums INTRO Questions & Observations Advantage of adding BG this time of year

There is a fish truck coming next Tuesday and I was wondering if by adding BG this time of year I could get by adding more smaller BG than having to pay for the bigger ones. Is there an advantage to adding them this time of year while appetites are down some?

Is there an advantage to adding them this time of year while appetites are down some?

Yes - less chance they will get eaten at least until spring. Put them into thick cover.

It is a numbers game on small vs large BG depending on your LMB sizes.

Fall fish are in better condition than spring fish too. They've been feeding actively for months.

Keep in mind, too, that if your pond produced bluegill as it should have, you will have a natural surplus of your own fish going into the winter.
If bass are overcrowded and your own bluegill numbers are low going into winter, survival rates of newly stocked bluegill will still be fairly low, over a three or four month period until the next spawn...unless these new fish are larger than the average predator's mouth.

If your BG seem to be in short supply and at least some bass appear thin or hungry why not use this time of year to remove some thin bodied bass in addition to adding more BG? Each bass you remove will result in more BG that survive. EACH average sized bass (8"-15") will eat around 200-400 BG per year; on average 1-2 per day.

I'd be very cautious of those end of the season deals on fish. Bluegill are very dificult to tell apart from other species and if they are less then honest, this is when they might try to sell something else then what you really want.

I bought copper nose bluegill for my ponds from Tyler Fish Farms because of his reputation and recomendeations from those I trust. I've been out on ponds with a variety of fish and had a biologist explain to me how bad it is if you get the wrong fish in there. In this case, it was a 25 acre pond with five types of perch that have pretty much ruined the pond for bass fishing.

Eddie

heybud, I strongly agree with Eddie on being careful in selecting your BG supplier, especially if you want CNBG.
There are some good suppliers of CNBG out of Arkansas, but I like the pure Florida strain, and again agree with Eddie that you can depend on Bob Waldrop’s CNBG.
The only other supplier that I know of is Todd Overton of Overton Fisheries and I have the 2nd generation of both gene pools.

There may be other suppliers of pure CNBG that I am not familiar with, but some of my Arkansas fish truck strain have been brutes, but I prefer the Florida characteristics.
Know your supplier is the best advise I have ever received.

I'd like to chime in once more on this topic.
First, define the need and then fulfill the need. If bass are overcrowded, take out some bass.
If the pond is short of bluegill, stock bluegill, with the understanding that smaller fish will have smaller survival rates when stocked on top of bass, especially overcrowded bass. It truly may be better economy to stock bigger bluegill for bigger dollars and bigger survival rates, depending on the status of the fishery.
Yes, pay attention to the supplier. There are some crooks out there, especially the "Free Fish" guy. Do business with people you know and trust. If you want to buy coppernose bluegill, specify and confirm and ask around, especially here on this site. Some of us have done business with most of the good suppliers. For example, not only am I a supplier, I am also a buyer and I know the reputable people. So does Todd, Waldrop, Dorsett and other people in the businesss. But, so does Eric West, George and other end consumers who buy fish for their ponds.
The last thing I wanted to address from this thread is Eddie's comment about the 25 acre lake. While that comment doesn't necessarily apply to the bluegill part of thread, it does need more definition. If a 25 acre lake with five species of sunfish has been "ruined" it isn't because there are five species of sunfish. If that logic were true, Lake Fork would be "ruined" for bass fishing. Five species of sunfish actually act to enhance a bass fishing lake, if the bass population is healthy and balanced. I would love to take a 25 acre lake with five species of overpopulated sunfish and fix it. I could do it in a day. In a case like that (which I haven't confronted in 30 years as a professional fisheries biologist) I would stock the missing size classes of bass and let them do the work on the five species of sunfish.
Back to the main point of Heybud's question...if the pond needs bluegill and that is the "problem", make sure of your supplier and understand exactly what you are buying. It will probably end up being more of a "feel good" purchase than one which changes the face of your fishery.

As usual, excellent information here on fish, stocking, best time of year, size to get, what to look out for: - the Pondbossman, his moderators and buddies are simply the best, I learn so much from you guys.

I suscribe too, and I recommend people sending out Christmas Gift Subscriptions, they tell a friend, they tell a friend and this chain gets more and more links in it.

I'm glad Lusk followed up with that clarification on 25 acres of water.

In my opinion bluegill stocked this time of year should be large enough to escape predation. So if the pond is bass-crowded you can decide what size bluegill you need based on the mouth size of the average bass that you've been catching. If there is a high likelihood of predation then wait till spring when water temps reach 75 and stock mature bluegill (3"+) so that you may get a spawn before predation takes a toll.

The importance of harvesting bass (if they are overpopulated) before stocking bluegill can not be over-emphasized.

This may be only slightly related but I was told once trout fingerlings were safe in water under 55 F. from Bass predation. They said no worries the bass were too slow and not that hungry in that cold of water. WRONG! The bass homed right in on them as if they'd just found the best thing in the world to eat! I believe most of them were gone in 20 minutes!

My Quote "...a 25 acre pond with five types of perch that have pretty much ruined the pond for bass fishing."

I was out on a boat with a State Biologist a few hours North of Ft. Worth, and helping him shock the water and then I scooped up the fish with a net. It was allot of fun to see what would float to the surface after he zapped the water. He identified them, kept a few and tossed the rest back into the pond.

Not being big on fishing or even into fish, I don't remember exactly what all we cought, just the overall impression of what he told me. I'm also probably wrong in calling them "perch" as I don't even know what a perch is. It's just a term that my wife and her family use all the time, and they love to fish. I just like digging in the dirt and mowing.

What I do remember is that the pond had some great catfish. We cought several in the ten pound range and could have cought allot more. They were everywhere. Bass were very rare and nothing over a pound was caught, nor did any of the homeowners on the lake remember catching any decent sized bass. Of the perch, or whatever they were, he used colors for them. Yellow, green, black and of course copper nose. I think there was another, but I can't say for sure what it was.

Of those fish, there was allot of the yellow and green. In his opinion, WAY TOO MANY!!!

From reading posts here and talking to others, I've always been under the impression that some perch are good, like coppernose, and others are bad. Avoid the bad ones and only put in coppernose bluegill.

Is this only for small ponds? or is there a size pond when you can have a larger variety?

I have coppernose bluegill in my 4 acre and 3/4 acre ponds. Is this good or should I add other types?

Thank you,
Eddie

Bad Boy! Bad Boy! Bad Boy Eddie. Fish of the sunfish family like bluegill, green sunfish, coppernose bluegill, etc. are NOT PERCH! I repeat they are NOT perch. I know you southern folks like to call them perch but they are NOT perch.



A perch is a fish of the percidae family like yellow perch, darters, walleye.

Got it!

Eddie,

Generally speaking, any of the lepomis family are fine as far as reproduction, food requirements, and forage production. The only problem from mixing the species would be crossbreeding, but that's not really a big problem. The larger the pond/lake, the less crossbreeding there should be. (again generalizing)

The shortage of bass in the 25 acre lake you spoke of was more likely because of catfish predation than overpopulated bluegill and coppernose bluegill. Of course I really don't know, but I'm just saying.

So, if I can ride on the coattails of this post... The fish truck is coming to my town this weekend also and I was thinking of adding some extra Red Ears to my pond. I have CNBG that had 10% RES from Tyler Fish Farm - but I want more RES.

I can purchase 2.5-4" size RES. I have 25 bass in the 12-15" range and hundreds in the 8-12" range on a 2 acre pond. Think many of these will make it if I put 100 in?

No. They are small enough to even be eaten by the smaller class of LMB.

Eddie, don’t let those northern boys mess with you….
We know our white perch, sun perch, goggle eye perch, and whoever heard of a white bass - we know a sand bass when we see one ... ... ...

You are in a enviable position of having ponds full of “pure” Florida CNBG and I would not ever consider diluting the strain.

At some time in the future you may want to consider introducing another pure Florida CNBG strain from another gene pool.

Well said George. I was in my fifties before I found out that only Yankees had perch. Or, as my Uncle in Mississippi said, "puhch". I still refuse to call sandies white bass.

I conform only on this site or when I'm trying to act knowledgeable.

OK, sounds like my ignorance runnith over!!!

A perch is not every type of fish that's not a bass or a catfish in a pond. I'll take everyone's word for it, but around here, that's what they will remain.

We're having too much fun catching Coppernose Bluegill PERCH!!! hahaha

Eddie

I'm wondering about possible mutual exclusivity there with that "or"

So, is it OK for me to put some pond perch in my pond?

BTW, sandie is a highly colloquil term associated with proximity to the metro-mess. I have never caught a sand bass in Livingston, many lots of white bass. I hear that Ray Hubbard is full of sand bass, though!

So Heybud did you get any fish or not?

Well, added 200 CNBG and 25 RES today. They all swam away so that looked good. Now we will wait and see if I have any left come spring. I have a little pond above the big one that I have been filling up with my water well and I added about 10 CNBG to it to see if they make it. It will be interesting. The fish looked good and the delivery guy gave me two albino catfish, so that was cool. I took pictures but can't seem to download them out of my camera.

Congratulations Larry!!!

Now stop messing around and get those photos downloaded and posted.

What is your water temp this time of year Larry?