Pond Boss Forums MANAGING AN EXISTING POND Corrective stocking Puzzled about where blue gill and bass have gone

About 4 years ago stocked my 1/2 acre pond with fathead minnows and 400 5 inch blue gill . Last year added twenty five 5 to 8 inch LMB.
There were plenty of frogs in the pond when I bought it five years ago. This year they're gone.
Last year I was catching the BG and LMB using regular fish pellets for bait. Would just push them on to the hook and cast out a few feet and bingo they would all rush to see who could get hooked the quickest.

This year the pond water is up about 3 feet and have not caught one bass and only 2 BG. I have caught about 150 or so very small bass (about 3 inches) and a few equally small BG.

Have been using all types of worm type baits as well as fly's rapellas, shad raps, jigs with twister tails etc but no luck. Can't see the in the water either. Have not seen any fatheads either.

Pond is about 3/4 acre and now maybe 8 ft deep.

Wonder where they all went ? Any ideas ?

Additionally concerned there are too many of those small bass.

Yoli,

That is disturbing. Is there a chance that you had a die-off over the winter? If your ice was completely covered with snow for several weeks, the small ones might have had enough oxygen to survive, but the bigger ones didn't. If it happened several weeks before ice-out, the carcasses might not have floated up.

Just a guess.

Ken

Ken
Well i ran the aerator in shallow water through the winter and it kept a nice open area on the water, the past winter was not that bad. Your idea, thought, did cross my mind but have never seen a dead fish in the pond.

I guess I'll just keep pluggin along.

Thanks for your comment

Odd - you have to many small LMB but can't catch any. They are usually starving and will bite anything.

No, as I said have caught about 150 small bass and a few small blue gill its just the larger ones that have been avoiding the bait.

I have concluded there are 3 possibilities.
1. as pointed out by Ken
2. I was poached out
3. the larger bass are stuffed from eating all the fatheads and small bluegills so my bait is weak.

Next time up there going to try some golden shiners or small blue gills for bait

You will almost always catch a small bass before a large one if they are in the same area. Small bass will bite without even thinking about it. While larger bass are not going to be so quick to bite. You may have to go to a larger bait. Crank a buzz bait or a large zoom super fluke. That may do it. This time of year is not the best either. The last 2 years I have noticed a big decline in my fish biting this time of year. Of course it's a lot hotter here then in WIS. I imagine. If we don't get any rain soon I may be able to work on my dam and not even drain my pond!!!

Thanks for that information about the larger bait
Last time up there i tried using large fat heads but the small bass basically killed them, they couldn't swallow the fat heads but they tried and the trying scared the fatheads to death. Also caught some real small bluegill and tried them as bait but no luck.
I'll give your suggestion on the larger lures a try.

The pond is thick now with small bass and blue gill so I've been catching them with small red worms and taking some to nearby ponds etc. You can catch 25 fish with the same worm before it shreds away. Afraid there are still way too many. I should have put 12 bass in the pond rather than the 25 as it seems the 25 have created 25,000 small bass and now for some reason after 5 years the blue gill population also has increased dramatically.

Over 10 inches of rain this month whereas last summer probably had 8inches in total.

the bass could be stunted at the small size

Yoli,

My guess would be the larger bass simply aren't hungry. If you have the amount of forage in their your saying they are probably feeding non-stop at will all the time, not having to move more than 10-15 feet to fill their gullets.

We also have a 1/2 acre pond and our total stocking numbers between all species was less than 100 fish. Our bluegill spawned this year for the first time and fishing took a dump for the most part. we can go down around 8-8:30 at night and the surface lights up like a hurricane coming through, the larger fish simply have no interest in anything other than YOY ..

I agree with RC though, bigger bait = bigger fish. I would try the larger bait and go with something as loud and annoying as possible to peak their interest.

Another option is try to find a friend or neighbor with a fish finder and go out marking them, if they are there they can be marked.

Attica
They're not hungry and or the smaller fish are simply too quick in getting to my baited hooks.

Just updating. Only go up to the pond once a month. Just returned from August visit and geez the mosquitoes are the worst they ever been and very few Dragonflies. Normally there are an abundance of dragonflies and few mosquitoes.
As for the fish I continued to catch numerous smaller bluegill and bass and relocated about another 25 or so to nearby river.

There was a difference this trip in that I did catch 3 of the larger bass (shad rap type lure) from last years stocking. They really had not gained much weight. Maybe I caught the smallest of that batch but had been thinking the bass were feasting on the small blue gill and these guys had not been to any feasts.
Furthermore I caught 2 very large blue gill. Thought they were small mouth as the prior owner once told me she had put 2 small mouth in the pond. They seemed too big. All the other blue gill were very small, smaller than the ones I had stocked 4 years ago. The large blue gill were returned to the pond and made me wonder what they had been eating.

Water levels remain a good 2 or 3 feet over what they were last year.

I think you were wise with the 100 fish even though your pond is deeper than mine and probably could support more. I went with the recommendation of the place i bought the fish and then reduced what they suggested.