Pond Boss Forums INTRO Questions & Observations Trophy LMB pond versus catch rate

When I started this pond management (or lack there of) journey my goal was to have a trophy bass pond. I thought the thrill of throwing out a lure and landing a 8+ pound bass (not sure what the definition of a trophy bass but I'd be happy if I ever caught an 8 pound bass) would be the be all end all goal of pond ownership. But as I've owned my pond my goals have changed. I really enjoy ponds with a high catch rate. DIED's sunfish pond and the "swimming pond" at the Lusk Lodge 2 come to mind. Throw in a lure and you're bound to catch a nice fish. Perhaps not a trophy fish but a fun time will be had. I no longer desire to have a trophy LMB pond but a pond with a high catch rate. Although the size and Wr of my LMB has improved significantly in the past 3 years, the catch rate on my pond has become dismal. I realize that there are multiple factors that can effect catch rate but this whole process has got me to thinking. (JHAP with an idle mind never results in a favorable outcome).


Part 1:
I own and have read "Raising Trophy Bass" multiple times and between this and what is posted here on the forums and in the magazine I have begun to wonder if the consequences of managing smaller pond (let's use the definition of 5 acres or less) for trophy bass will have the side effect of reducing the catch rate of the pond significantly.

In the November/December 2009 Pond Boss magazine, in the "Ask the Boss" section Dr. Richard Anderson discusses research that he is conducting in regards to LMB and hook avoidance. In the magazine he states "I hope to submit an article on the results on research in a .5-acre ponds in Missouri. Several ponds were stocked with adult bass that were naive, i.e. never had seen a lure. Ponds were fished for half an hour by two people once a week. The biggest change in fishing success happened from the first week to the second. Learning and hook avoidance is a well recognized phenomenon."


Part of the response from Bob Lusk is "I don't think people totally understand the concepts of learning and hook avoidance. Generally speaking, people (even Pond Boss readers) are still naive about the subject. Some people believe it to be gospel while others think fish don't have any ability to come to conclusions, even when a lure is stuck in their faces way too often."

So given that a pond can only support so many pounds of predators (50-75 pounds of LMB per surface acre based upon "Raising Trophy Bass") which using lets say an 8 pound bass means 6 to 9 bass per surface acre, it seems to me that in a smaller pond (5 acres or less) you are only talking about 30 to 45 LMB that are in the 8+ pound category in a 5 acre pond (and only 18 to 27 in my 3 acre pond). That's not very many. And given the hook avoidance/hook smart phenomenon it further seems to me that by managing a pond for "trophy LMB" you are ultimately managing a pond for hook smart fish and ultimately the catch rate will suffer.


Part 2:

Given a pond on which you cannot artificially feed and cannot aerate (absentee ownership and no power to the property) if you were managing a pond for higher catch-ability and didn't care about a trophy anything what management techniques would you use toward the goal of higher catch rates and fish with decent Wr (or at least not skinny fish).


Thoughts, speculations, pontifications, idle gossip, rumor mongering?


PS
As an also and besides, my pond currently contains LMB, GSF, BG, RES and Gambusia. I may add golden shiners from Anderson's this spring. I would like to add Sacramento Perch. I know, I know, way too many species, probably but heck Sunil does it. I'd rather have a pond with a higher catch rate and don't care anymore about trophy bass.

PPS
I still haven't full absorbed Eric's "Unintended Consequences" article. I think I need three or four more read throughs. But based upon my first read through I think we're all kidding ourselves about bending a pond to our will.

Quote from JHAP

"Given a pond on which you cannot artificially feed and cannot aerate (absentee ownership and no power to the property) if you were managing a pond for higher catch-ability and didn't care about a trophy anything what management techniques would you use toward the goal of higher catch rates and fish with decent Wr (or at least not skinny fish)."

Hey JHAP, I looked at this quote and this is me in a nut shell. If your pond is 3 acres I wouldn't think you would have any issues having pleanty of nice 2 lbs bass to catch or bigger. I understand what you mean about quantity and no so much quality as far as size goes. I enjoy catching 13 inch bass almost as much as 16 or 17 inch ones. I would think you would have to do just the oppisite of what you did to get the big bass. Your going to have to cull the largest of bass let the bass spawn and stop culling the 14 inch bass. Basically you will need to ride the edge of over population. Or once again your bass will get hook savy. That's one thing I like about my pond. My bass are small yes but I always seem to be able to go catch 10 or 12 of them almost every time I am out there. Along with a few nice GSF I might add!! I am interested in hearing what the experts have to say about this as this is right up my alley as far as my pond goes.

Thanks,

Jeff you have stated the dilema that we all face. We would like to have a high catch rate of trophy fish.

When I purchased my place all we ever caught was 13 inch bass that were skinny (typically 13 to 14 ounces). In 2008 I caught a 4 pound chunky bass. Here's the thread. Jeff catches his personal best LMB.

I'm curious to hear what the experts say as well.

PS, I'm looking at that photo of you of the 8 pound 10 ounce bass and thinking how realistic is it to have very many of those swimming around a 3 acre pond? That thing is a monster!!!

PPS,
If half of these people ever caught a 1 pound GSF their thoughts about them would change completely. I still contend that pound per pound a GSF is a much tougher striking and fighting fish than BG or RES.

I'm beginning to think that might be mutually exclusive. Perhaps just a high catch rate nice Wr pond is more realistic. I'm interested in what opinions are.

Yeah that fish I caught would rule a 3 acre pond! Not sure how many of them you would have. Maybe 2 or 3 and some 5 pounders to go with it. I agree with the GSF those things nail my little Hula popper like they haven't eating in weeks!! I am culling the smaller ones I catch but will keep the one's 7 inches and bigger. The kids love cathing them too.

Here's the deal. Once you get everything lined out just the way you want it, you have to work your rear end off to keep it that way.

I would imagine that your catch rates would go up as your relative weights went down.... If supplementally feeding fish food is out of the question, Jeff than I would recommend doing other things to increase your carrying capacity, WR, and catch rates.

Just doing one or two little things to your pond may not get you many visible results, but if you come at it at several different small angles, you can increase carrying capacity, WR's, and catch rates!

-Think about creative ways to add food to your pond while you are there and also while you are away- fertilizers, insects, islands, aquatic vegetation, shallow wetland areas that are attached to the main body, etc. to increase carrying capacity.

-Catch and eat bass of all sizes to make room for younger dumber generations of fish. Catch and release typically doesnt help longterm catch rates.

-Strategically make and place your fish structures to help increase catch rates.

-Stock your sacramento perch! You wont ever be satisfied with your pond until you have at least a few of them in there!!

Nate great answer.
JHAP the trophy vs. quality vs. catch rate is a giant gray area. We have clients to every degree. If you have not harvested many bass in the last few years then the Wr should be lower but yet the catch rate is going down this is function of fishing pressure? Let’s look at that. How many times you go fishing? If say 10 times per year I do think that is the case. If just a few times and think that is right due to family situation this past year it could be function of bad luck ( bad weather) when you are there.

If indeed you took out good number of bass then yes you need to way this out with your goals of growth vs. catch #’s. Keep in mind if you enjoy catching numbers of green sunfish or bluegill their numbers will actually go up with bass harvest. So better quality bass means more fun catching size bluegill.

So what else can you do? Is the pond clear? If so then think about fertilizing. You are probably not getting anywhere near the 50-75 lbs of bass you are talking about you may only be producing 30-50 lbs. Diversifying the bass diet is another way. Also form pure catch perspective put and take, catfish trout seasonally, etc. is easy way to go. Do you really think a feeder will walk off? That would bug me because it means guys might also be stealing your fish maybe that is why you can’t catch many. I would look into ways to keep poachers off the property. If you can keep a feeder that might go a long ways in helping your goals. GL

I also have a 3 acre pond and yes you can catch fish that big in them. Me and my friends have caught 15 to 20 LMB from the 5# to 8# range with the bigest being 9 3/4# fish. My pond is 40 years old though so i dont know how much that has to do with it. I feed the fish every other day or when i get down there to it. and i dont do anything like some of the guys on the site do with there ponds as in fertilizing and other things. If fish that big can live in my pond i dont know why they couldnt in yours cause mine is nothing special.

Natester,
The problem I have with using a feeder is my erratic schedule when it comes to visiting the pond. During tax season I don't see the pond for 3 months and in a year like this one we've only been to the pond twice. In a normal year we visit the pond once per month in April through December. That was our schedule last year. This year, well you all know the story.

I had a conversation with the folks an Anderson Minnows at this year's Pond Boss conference. I'm thinking of adding a box of Golden Shiner minnow fry in 2010.

I've never fertilized and that might be a possibility.

I've also never harvested bass so that is something I need to do.

Placing fish structure is probably a really good idea. There are a couple of places where the pond has natural structure (the remnants of an old pier and a root from an old oak tree) and fish definitely congregate around those.

Greg,
It's definitely not fishing pressure, at least not this year.

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Here a time line of the pond:

11/2005
Bought property

2006 Catch rates were high but Wr for LMB was low. We had only 3 species of fish in the pond, LMB, GSF and Bullheads. Throw out a line and a skinny LMB or a nice GSF (not unusual to catch 10-11 inch GSF) would attack the line. We tried to manually remove Elodea and it was a disaster. Sure we removed a lot of Elodea on a short term basis but we caused it to spread like wildfire.

03/2007
Stocked BG and a few adult RES (I believe it was 18 RES).

2007 (The remainder of the year) We didn't visit the property much, that was the year that Ricki had her neck surgery due to the auto accident. We visited in late May or early June and the pond was teeming with fish. Unfortunately the Elodea on the pond was out of control, probably 80% coverage. Between June and November we did not visit the pond. When we went in November fishing on the pond was dead. In addition we didn't see fish anywhere. This is the year that I believe that we had a major fish kill. I speculate that when the Elodea died back (which it does at our place in the winter) that it caused an oxygen crash and took out a bunch of fish.

2008
A year where we visited the pond a bunch. Once per week from April through December with the exception of I think November. Fishing was lousy in terms of number of fish caught for the entire year. In August of 2008 is when I caught my 4 pound bass. We had never seen any fish anywhere near that big prior to this catch. We treated the Elodea with Reward/Cutrine and really knocked it back. We saw tons of YOY fish in 2008, small bass, unfortunately clouds of bullhead. Ricki caught a juvenile RES and we caught a few mid sized BG.

2009
Well you all know the story. We've only been to the pond twice. We did see a lot of fry this year during the April visit. Fishing was lousy for both the April and the June visit this year. When we were there in June we spot treated two areas of the pond for Elodea and American Pond Weed but the weed situation was much better than in past years. We're heading back up there for 3 weeks or so in December. Hopefully 2010 will be another year of once per week visits after tax season. There were tons of YOY bass in the pond in June of this year, in fact they would nip at you when floating in the pond. We also saw congregations of YOY BG.

The pond was fished daily for one week a month in 2006 and 2008. Very little fishing occurred in 2007 and this year.

When we were there this June I fully expected the fishing to be fantastic (It was in 2006 during the summer months). This year's June fishing was a complete dud.

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So I don't think it is a function of fishing pressure. Of course our fishing skill (or more to the point lack there of) could be called into question but we certainly had high catch rates in 2006.

So it sounds like I need to pull out bass. Should I remove any and every bass that I catch?

The pond is fairly clear. I need to get a secchi disk but I can tell you just from visual observation that for most of the year the pond is clear. Although DIED commented more than once that it appeared that we had a good algae bloom going on so what do I know. I had never considered fertilizing in the past because of the Elodea problem. It seems we have the Elodea much more under control now.

My good friend DIED visited the pond last weekend and he told me that the pond looked great, the weeds are in check, he didn't have time to fish and didn't see any fish swirling about the surface. He also said that there we no signs of anyone having been around the pond. We had been having problems with that in the past but we now have 100% of the property line fenced and have installed "No Trespassing, No Hunting, No Fishing" signs all along our 30 acres of fence line and along every road and path to the pond. It is impossible to approach our pond without seeing a sign.

So it sounds like remove LMB and perhaps fertilize.

The main issue that I have we a feeder is that at most we are only at the property once per month and for tax season we don't get there for three months. I'm not afraid of the feeder being stolen (heck if people wanted to steal stuff there are a lot more valuable things to steal than a fish feeder) it's more a function of the feeder not being refilled for weeks at a time.

Several good answers have been given.
I'll take you in a different direction.
If I asked "Where can we go to catch the biggest bass?" You would think about it and give your answer. If I asked, "What about a big striper?" Different answer. How about lake trout, trolling 90 feet deep?" A different answer.
As goes the habitat, so goes what lives in it. If you want to manage for large fish, you must supply the habitat not only for big fish, but also for what big fish eat. That means you need variety of habitat.
Here's my point...Each one of these three situations have thriving, even legendary, fisheries because they have habitat which is conducive to those fish which thrive.
As goes your habitat, so goes your fishery.
I electrofished a 3 acre pond in Oklahoma several days after the Pond Boss conference...wrote about it in this issue. It has the perfect habitat for each fish which the landowner wants to manage and much to my surprise, this little waterbody is thriving...the surprise is how well his black crappie are working, because those creatures ALWAYS overeat the food chain. They overeat the smaller fish, tainting the food chain for the larger predators. In this case, habitat was perfect for sunfish, too...the saving grace here. Everyone who studies bass management for long quickly learn bluegill are the backbone of the food chain. I've begun to expand that theory by contending the bass ALWAYS overeat the food chain if not properly culled and managed. I'm now beginning to think differently. I contend that the perfect habitat for bluegill is the backbone of bluegill, which allow them to be the backbone of bass' food chain.

Regarding the 50-75 pounds of bass per acre, "normal" is that mass is a mixture of different size and age classes of bass. In a 3 acre pond, there might be 5-8 large bass...that's it. But, there would be 200-250 adult bass, too. If someone catches more than that, either it's a short time anomaly (because those large fish will, over three or four years, will run out of consistent sources of food)or they're catching the same fish over and over. If your mission was to try to grow ALL your bass to 8+ pounds, you'll fail. If you were able to do it, that segment of your fishery would collapse four to five years later, when those fish reach the ends of their lives.
There's lots more to think about, and I gotta go make a living, so I'll close with this...give this some thought and it will impact your management strategy.
To understand how to impact catch rates, you must know what makes a bass bite a hook.
What are the reasons?
Big bass don't grow larger unless they eat...a lot.
Reason #1) They bite because they are hungry.
Small bass run in schools and are quite competitive.
Reason #2) They bite because they react to the stimulus of something hitting their "zone". These are "reaction" strikes. Aggressive...bites to fight for food or to be the first one to hit something.
As larger fish become the "alpha" fish, they become territorial. You'll find those larger fish in an area which is conducive to everything they need (habitat)...such as close food supplies, safe place to hide, shallow water to deep water quickly and so on. When a fish bites here, it can be either #1 or #2 or a third reason. Reason #3, a "defensive" strike. This occurs when anglers are sight fishing...female on a nest, or when casting into an area and a bass is just doing its job.
Hungry fish feed when they are hungry...that's one of the "catch 22" issues of pond management. If we do our job and produce lots of food, Reason #1 is eliminated. If we don't have habitat for large fish, there goes most of Reason #3...except one month of spawning activity. That leaves Reason #2, which typically exclude larger bass.
If you can combine all three of these reasons into your management strategies, your catch rates will rise.
Now, how can you do that?
Have a groovy day, all you fervent thinkers of pondmeisterisms.

I have heard stories from neighbors that years ago folks would regularly catch 6 pound bass in this pond. Of course I was also told the pond was close to 40 foot deep when we bought it - at full pool it's about 18 feet deep at the deepest point. This pond has never received any management until we came along. It was built in the 1940's sometime. It is fed by two springs and a seasonal creek which is probably the only reason that it isn't a dead pond at this age.

Yes Jeff as I thought. A large hopper feeder can hold 200 lbs of feed. Plenty for 2 months on minimum setting. Try the GSH fry not sure if they will make it or not. Run Wr on bass ( gotta catch one first I guess) that will help clue you in on harvest or not. Add cover. Keep weeds at bay and try out fertilizer. These things will all lead to more fish thus more fish to catch. I will hold your hand on feritlizer apps. jsut give us a call. Probaby not reason to start until after tax season since not be around to monitor the success. Check water quality as well to see if lime is needed. GL

Thanks Bob, I've got some thinking to do.

Jeff I think this is an apt comment. Give a man a fish and feed him for a day , teach a man to fish and feed him for a lifetime.

The best thing we can do is provided knowledge not answers. Knowledge so that you can be confident in your assessment of the pond. Understanding how the fish populations fit together is the key. First are the physical factors in place - water quality , DO , the plant community , the absence of un-natural mortality factors (poachers be they man , animal or nature) and the chemical balance to provide food (plankton from the right nutrients). Then are the fish right for the situation in all aspects type , size and number. After that it’s a question of balancing.



I have a suggestion. Get out all your pics of fish from the pond and post them with a date (oldest to newest). Include a narrative by date of major actions taken and what you saw. We can go from there. I will say this - the 4 lb LMB which you posted a pic of is not indicative of a pond with problems. Ponds are dynamic systems and are constantly undergoing change. It’s how you manage the changes that makes the difference. See the current PB mag article on unintended consequences and note the comment on managing a system perched on the unstable cusp midway between 2 stable but unwanted conditions.

Jeff, I'm sure this has occurred to you. As an absentee pondmeister, how do you know that you are the only one catching the fish?

I have this very same problem. And I have bought 2 game cameras that I am going to setup in spots fairly hidden to see if I can get some pictures of what may or may not be going on at my pond. Most of these cameras can take pictures up to 25 feet away. In my case that gives me a lot of spots to put cameras and see what's going on. Then when I go out the next time I can check them. If one is destroyed or stolen then I know for sure I have a human problem on my hands.

We'll be doing the same thing since there are adjoining farms and ATV trails that could potentially go right by our pond.

There, I fixed the quote.

Your description of your fishery has me thinking you had a fish kill in the winter of 2007 even without you mentioning that.

My suggestion would be to get your buddy DIED to spend some time helping you and Ricki perform an angling survey using some of Bill Cody's tactics and then carefully document everything you catch and report the results and pics online!!!

Thank you for the feedback Greg. I didn't realize that feeders could hold enough food to last a month or so until a forum member (who shall remain nameless unless they want to reveal it, PM'd me and told me as much). Hmmm, I might have to create a line item in next year's personal budget for a feeder and food.

I will definitely take you up on the fertilizer assistance, being able to property apply and monitor fertilization scares the heck out of me.

Ok, I'll do my homework and post the results. The hard disk drive that contains my pond stuff is currently suffering from swine flu or something. We're (meaning Ricki) going to try to get it feeling better so that I can access that data this week/weekend. I do have photos some fish and I believe that will provide some background.



I've read this article twice and need to re-read it. I've got to tell you though it isn't very comforting information though.

Jeff you can even get larger feeders than what Greg is mentioning. I have a feeder that will hold 1000 pounds of corn dry weight and another that will hold 650 pounds of corn. One is a custom made feeder that can be used around cows without them being able to tear it up and the other one is a sweeny. Either one could possibly feed for quite a while if the food doesn't go bad in the hot sun.