Pond Boss Forums STOCKING A NEW POND Types of fish to choose new guy here with FH fry!

I've been lurking for a couple of months and this is a great sight.

We had so much rain in April that our tanks filled up enough to try some stocking.

About a month ago I put 15 CC fingerlings, 15 HBG, and one pound of FH's in a small tank.

In the big tank I put 75 CC, 25 HBG, and 2two pounds of FH's.

Yesterday I finally saw some fry swimming around in the small tank.

I've yet to see any cats or the bluegill. Hopefully they're swimming around in there.

My question is this. These tanks are small so I don't want anything that will clean the tank out.

What other fish would go well with the cats and bluegill?

I will do some fishing but mostly the tanks will be my giant aquarium.

I guess I'm reliving my childhood when we fish any place we could and I had a few aquarium going all the time.

Thanks in advance.

Welcome to Pond Boss, Davy Jones.

Most fish that you can fish for are going to eat other fish except maybe some smaller bluegills.

What are the sizes of your tanks?

Sunil,

The small one is about a tenth of an acre with a wood pallet, two cement culverts for structure and about a foot of visibility.

The large one is about a half acre with a pallet, three cement culverts for structure and an inch visibility.

Both have a depth of 6 to 8 feet.

I walked the perimeter of the small tank again today and counted at least 300 FH fry.

Some were very small, the others were almost 3/4 of and inch.

There were minnows jumping around so I guess they're being chased by the HBG or CC's.

I've been feeding catfish chow for a couple of weeks.

Neither the fatheads nor the HBG's will provide an adequate forage base for the cats so you will have to feed. The minnows will certainly spawn but their small size will not provide the protein requirements for the cats. The hybrids will certainly enjoy them and will somewhat spawn.

Your pond will certainly take several hundred more hybrids with no biomass problem. Neither cats nor hybrids will adequately control either native or coppernose bluegills with their enthusiastic spawning.

For fishing enjoyment, I have often recommended a combination of cats and hybrids, with a feeder, for smaller ponds.

If we stock more BG are you saying stick to the hybrid because they spawn at a lower rate?

The native and copperhead will overload the tanks?

I don't think I want to do that.

Correct. Northern BG or CNBG would need a better predator than CC (think bass).

Year later update.

Soon after I stocked the tanks the drought almost wiped us out. The tanks didn't go dry but they got really low.

I fed the CC's all winter. Right now some of them are over a foot long. That's pretty cool!

A couple weeks ago I was out feeding and saw some small HBG!

All I can figure is the the HBG spawned last fall and survived the winter.

Also pretty cool!

I restocked some more HBG and FHM three weeks ago then two weeks ago we had 8 inches of rain in a matter of a few hours and I lost a lot of fish over the spillway. Yikes.

But the good news is that in the small tank some of the FHM survived the flood and spawned and the fry are now attacking the food I throw out.

I've yet to see any fry in the big tank.

Hopefully the FHM in the big tank will get with the program.

Now a few questions.

At what point do I need to remove the larger CC?

Will they wipe out the HBG over time if I let them get 5 or 10 pounds?

I would eat the cats when they get to 2 to 2.5 pounds. They are cheap to replace. At 3 to 4 pounds, a cat become a serious predator. It will eat anything it can get into its mouth. They are a put and take fish. Of course, some of them can get pretty tough to catch and eliminate.