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How about a high end idea and a low end idea, CJB?



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Is your goal good numbers of eating sized cats or to grow some bigger ones more for recreation?

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My goal is eating sized cats.



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High end: Remove the current fish population, weather it be via chemical or draining. Remove any and all cover and I mean anything that could allow catfish to spawn in it. Allow the the pond to fill up. Stock it with 10 pounds of FHM, 50 RES and however many CC you plan to eat in a year. Install a high quality feeder and sling out catfish feed like Aquamax 2000. Feed twice a day as much as your CC will eat in about 10-15 minutes. Each year thereafter stock the amount of CC you plan to eat in a year. The RES should maintain numbers and will act as a minor additional food source for your CC while also controlling snail population which may help with parasite issues in the pond. IME, FHM will maintain a breeding population under just CC predation and should control mosquito larvae as well also provide bonus feed to your CC.

Low end: Catch, kill, remove, relocate, destroy as many of the BG as you can. Your bass pond should provide you with some cull bass in the 8"-12" size... I would relocate 10-15 of these bass to this pond and they should start working to help you control the BG numbers as well. BG and CC compete with each other when CC are smaller in size, but the size CC you'd be stocking(10"-12") shouldn't be in direct competition with the BG for long. A big issue will be the BG eating the feed you intend for the CC. If you go the natural food chain route which is really going low end, you won't be able to stock as many CC or their growth rate will be very slow. If you feed the fish in a manner similar to above, you can consider stocking more. Again, they should be stocked annually at the 10-12" size range.

There are lots of ways to reach eating size catfish goals. I am not saying mine is the only nor the best. Just throwing my ideas out there. However, I will say as has been said on here before. CC get hook smart very fast... So if you catch a CC, keep it or you may never catch him again! The last thing you want are a bunch of hook shy 10+ CC's taking up all the biomass of your pond...

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What's the reason for stocking 10"-12" CC vs fingerlings (which are cheaper)? Other than the fact that they will be ready to eat sooner. Would fingerlings not survive?



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Smaller sizes will become easy snacks, particularly if you have bass in the pond. In the high end scenario, you can probably get away with smaller fingerlings as there wouldn't be any bass in your pond.

You have to think about how many CC you want to harvest annually and at what size you would prefer to harvest them. You can then decide if feeding, aeration, etc will be needed to reach those goals.

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OK, an update on this project. I suckered a few different people over a few different saturdays into helping me start (and then re-start) a siphon to drain the pond. It took a few tries but we finally got it working. The siphon lowered the water by about 8 feet and in the deepest spot the pond is still 8 feet deep. I would need to basically start over with a new siphon because the pipe I have won't take it any lower. I'd rather not spend the money, but am open to it if it's the right move. I've also had my two traps in the pond pretty much non stop over the last month transferring BG to the bass pond. Usually 30-60 BG per day. I've moved the traps around the pond and am not catching as many as I used to. So maybe I'm making progress. I've also started clearing out everything that CC could spawn in. Do you think I could go ahead and stock CC now? The pond is probably .25 to .3 acres right now. What problems would I introduce by stocking CC now? Is there a best time of year to stock them?

Last edited by Nathan Payne; 06/10/10 12:39 PM.


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I probably wouldn't stock this time of year. The water is probably pretty warm and, being bottom water, might be of questionable quality.


It's not about the fish. It's about the pond. Take care of the pond and the fish will be fine. PB subscriber since before it was in color.

Without a sense of urgency, Nothing ever gets done.

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Well I have kind of the same problem, except I caused mine for overstocking it.

I wanted fish in it quickly and took the suggestion from the fish farm.

I had not found Pond boss before or would have received the info I needed.

Will try to start documenting the progress of my pond and let every one know how it is going since way too many fish are in the pond and I am not sure how fast any of them will grow now.

The only benefit I see right now is that you can catch a HBG every cast, which makes it fun for the kiddos.

The problem with this is that they are only 3-5 inches long and do not give the other fish a chance to take the bait.

I know that CC are hook shy but I really want to catch a few of them just to see if they have grown any since I stocked them in Dec. 2009. They only thing I helps me out with this pond is that it is surrounded by trees so I am sure many bugs and other critters fall in the water, otherwise there may not be any food at all.

Will try to upload some pics and may even start a new Post.

Just may be a while as we have had over 3 inches of rain today and if you as much as sneeze you can't get to the pond that I stocked.

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How big is that pond in the background with the kid holding the CC?

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I have a small 1/3 acre pond next to my larger pond that I want to make into a CC pond as well. My experience with a feeder is that it attracts and holds geese better than fish.

What would you stock for forage for the CC so they will grow? Is there enough natural forage in a field pond to get decent CC growth?



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FHM and GSH would both be suitable forage species. I wouldn't stock BG or any hard finned species. As far as decent growth rates, that is related to stocking density and what your definition of decent is... If you aren't feeding, I would keep the stocking rate at or less than 50 per acre. Have you thought about using sinking feed to making it harder on the geese to chow down on the pellets?

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I have never seen sinking bait? Can you give me a name? The only catfish food around here floats. Maybe dog food?



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Originally Posted By: Nathan Payne
What's the reason for stocking 10"-12" CC vs fingerlings (which are cheaper)? Other than the fact that they will be ready to eat sooner. Would fingerlings not survive?


CJBS answered it pretty well. From my experience here in Virginia and West Virginia, the price difference between 10-12 inch catfish vs. fingerlings hardly enters into the equation. 4-5 inch fish are $0.75 each. 10-12 inch fish are $1.50 each.

I put 4-5 inch fish in several years ago. I believe they were all eaten the first day. In recent years, I've put in 10-12 inch CC. They have been so successful, I haven't really kept track of them. If put them into the pond by Memorial Day, they are 16-18 inches by Labor Day. By the following May, they are 20-24 inches.

The only real problem is that they are fairly smart, and they have long memories. I've again got some that must be approaching 30 inches, and they know a hook-and-line from everything else they like to snack on.

I credit them for helping me maintain a pond full of citation size bluegill, which is my main goal.

Ken


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Catmandoo,

Do you feed them or do they grow that size naturally? I just drained my pond and all the CC I bought from Zett's morphed into Brown Bullheads! 198 out of 200. Imagine that?



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Originally Posted By: Mark Brown
Catmandoo,

Do you feed them or do they grow that size naturally? I just drained my pond and all the CC I bought from Zett's morphed into Brown Bullheads! 198 out of 200. Imagine that?


Hey Mark,

For much of the last year I've not been feeding everyday because I'm staying in an apartment near work during the week. But, I'm feeding at least three nights per week.

Interestingly, the feed I've been using for the past couple of years is both floating and sinking. I've been using Southern States Li'l Strike, which is a 36% protien 1/8-inch pellet. About 1/3 of the pellets sink soon after hitting the water. The bluegill, bass, and trout suck it off the top. The catfish seldom come to the top for it, but I know they are cleaning it off the bottom.

I suspect that most of the catfish nutrition comes from natural food inside the pond, and not the food I use.

That is unfortunate about your bullheads from Zetts. Have you talked to Andrew Zetts about it? I suspect the problem was due to inexperienced help. Everyone there is always very nice to me, but some of the younger guys wouldn't know a trout from a catfish.

I've bought channel cats from them a number of times, and have never had a problem. Only once have I bought small ones (4"). The rest of the time I've bought the 10-12 inch. With that size, there is no mistaking that they are channel cats.

Ken


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The place I'm thinking to use sells 4-6" CC for $.30. 11-14 inchers are $2.50/lb. I still haven't decided which I'm going to use. I guess I have time now since I need to wait for the water to cool back down.

Quick question for the experts out there: Does sinking catfish food do OK in a pond that stratifies? ie if the bottom of the pond has low levels of DO will catfish go down there to eat the food?



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I would go ahead and stock the CC now. Whereever you get them from nearby is gonna have warm water. Just make sure you acclimate them to your pond water by adding a little at a time to the bags or other transport container. I also wouldnt start off with any sinking food. That would do better as the surface temp gets too cold for them to surface feed. When that time comes, mix some in with the floating for the transition period. If you can get some of Cat's suggested feed, that would be ideal.


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Hey Cat,

I have talked with Mrs. Zett and she says there is no way they a mistake when thet sold me 200CC fry to get my pond started. We drained it and all the cats were BB-not a single CC.

She said bring her one to prove it so i froze one and am going to take it to her when I restock. She said she would give me CC for free so we will see. They also said I needed snails to create an enviroment so I got 200 of them. 5 years later when drained you couldn't walk across the bottom without stepping on them. So now I have snail issues as well.

Hopefully, when I restock I can get some larger RES and larger CC as I will be moving a lot of mature LMB and BG back into the larger pond.



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Speaking of inexperienced help, Rex last week picked up fish that were going to be on the truck for a number of days. In that instance, you want to be sure that they are purged to keep the ammonia and other waste levels down. One of the helpers at the hatchery thought the fish should be fed so they don't starve during the long trip.....


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Well, it turns out it wasn't expensive at all to get the PVC to siphon it all the way down. I'm using 2" PVC and it's lowering the level about 3" per day. So I'm thinking to drain it all the way down and start fresh in the fall. Once I get it going as a catfish-only (plus forage) pond I'm planning to restock it every year or two to replace the ones I harvest. A few years from now when I have 2+ pound CC in there will I be able to stock the cheaper 4-6" inch CC fingerlings or will the big ones eat them?

Last edited by Nathan Payne; 06/22/10 11:23 AM.


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If you put in 6"-9" CC in the Spring and feed 'em, they'll be 2+ lbs within 12 months. The price difference around here between the 4"-6" and the 6"-9" isn't worth the time playing around with the smaller ones.


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So a 6" CC likely won't get eaten by a bigger one?



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I think the biggest factor is gape size, and compared some fish, CC have a pretty small gape in relation to body size.


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Another update on this project. And a couple of new questions. But first a picture:

The pond (puddle) is about half the size of what the picture shows now. I forgot to take my camera when I went to check this morning. The siphon quit sucking so it won't drain any further. The water that's left is about a foot deep (with maybe another foot or so of muck underneath). It is roughly a circle that's 40 feet across. I would like to use hydrated lime to kill everything that's left in it. How do I calculate how much to use? Or is it just trial and error until I get the pH to 11? Also, our dog likes to swim in the pond. Should we keep him tied so he doesn't get in it? How long should we keep him tied? Or will he avoid it on his own?



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