Pond Boss Forums MANAGING AN EXISTING POND Corrective stocking fished out of balance

Hello all, my name is Dan, I'm new to the forum (obviously haha). I have a serious situation and could use the expertise of the folks here very badly.
Ok, here goes... two years ago I did some forage stocking of my 1.3 acre 22 ft deep central Illinois pond. The pond is spring fed and has always had exceptionally clear water. I stocked 300 hybrid crappie, 100 4-6 lmb, 100 4-6 channel cats. My intention was to feed a very hearty base of 50 to 60 7-10 lb channel cats and 30 to 40(?) 3 to 5 lb lmb. My pond is rather healthy(well it was) with fresh water clams and such thriving and a twice a year turn over that clears the water even more. All is great until one dismal day that I shall not forget any time soon.... I get to my pond to find a fella and his buddy that I didn't know hauling up from the dock at least 15 of the cats and 4 or 5 of the larger bass. Aside from reaching for my sidearm, I asked the gent exactly what the heck he was doing(not in exactly that verbiage I might add). He told me that he was a friend of my dead father-in-law and that he received permission to fish from my mother-in-law. After the steam stopped spewing from my ears, I called my m-i-l and sure enough..."Oh yes please go fishing thats what its for, have a good time and take as many as you like" was the horrific answer I got. I was then and there aware of the fact the deed was done. I could not hang the dingbat by his toes and get away with it so iI shewed him away with a "I better not see you here again" look. Sooo, all that being said, I now have way to many forage fish and a redear population that could feed a small army. The cats seem to be doing well though the average size dropped about 4 lbs. the bass however are small, infrequent and couple have a larger than average head and super skinny body. They look sickly. Though its not the case with all of them, I am concerned about some type of bacteria or such and would like to stop it from spreading if at all possible. The balance is clearly out. This pond is 37 years old(1 year younger than I) and has been great with no problems that I can ever remember, until now. How do I get the population back to balance? Is population control the answer to my woes? I considered a few northern pike to rid the redear population of the overabundance but that doesn't seem to be the answer for the bass. Please help with any suggestions. I am open to trying anything at this point. p.s. I have had a discussion with the rest of the family and it is now a standing rule that its catch and release only until I get this problem solved and after that no one but family may remove a fish under pain of death. I feel confident that this type of fiasco will not happen again. Please Help. Thanks a bunch folks and all the best, Dan

Welcome to PB. First you need to be sure of the facts. Start a log of what you see listing sizes , types and condition of all fish. Do a seine survey (see link below on population balance). Without knowing who fishes you will have trouble carrying out your plan. I would suggest that you talk to the family and see if you can say - no one fishes unless a family member is with them. Get control of the people first then the fish.

http://www.pondboss.com/forums/ubbthreads.php?ubb=showflat&Number=92492#Post92492

Hi Dan,

Welcome to the forum! Too bad you found us because of a problem. The good news is all of us here will help you in any way we can. The great news is you have one of the best lake managers around these days in your back yard if needed. It would be money very well spent if you called Nate Herman of HB Pond Management .

You said yor pond is healthy and "very clear". Very clear water means sterile or infertile water to us and also means you do not have a good base for the food chain. If your bass are skinny with big heads, they are starving and/or stunted and should be removed. Most likely you are way overpopulated with bass or the forage base (bluegill) is nearly gone.

There will be several ways for you to get your pond back to what you want it to be, but none will be quick and all will take work.

The first thing I would do is change your catch and release rule to remove all bass under 15 inches that are not as fat as a football.

There will be many more suggestions forthcoming. In the meantime, can you post some pictures and tell us what forage fish you have in the water? Do you have a good plant base in parts of the pond?

On a personal note, who supplied your Hybrid Crappie?

Hello mhmacw and welcome to Pond Boss. Trespassing and poaching are huge issues for pond ownership but unfortunately if the "visitors" are invited on the property then they are neither trespassing nor poaching. Time to have a talk with M-I-L.

Anyhoo welcome to Pond Boss, we're glad you found us.

Thanks for the kind welcome. Not all forums these days are of such a kind nature. I have stopped the fishing as it were. That is all catch and release any way. To that I'd say the fishing is at leas stabilized with no more taken out till further notice. I will get a host of pictures to aid in the suggestions. I should be able to do that on the next sunny day...(tomorrow maybe). When I say clear I'd say you can see well to about 6 ft and see larger fish swimming around the 12 ft mark. I'll have to look up the stock supplier though I can say it's delivered to the Peoria area ag center near St. Vincent school if that helps. I love the idea of all under 15 to go unless related to a football haha. Great alalogy. Let me get some more info and I'll post it by tomorrow arfternoon. Thanks again. I'ts a great help. As always ..all the best, Dan

With regards to the large head skinny bass:

You might have a lot of forage in the pond, but it might be of a size that those LMB cannot utilize, or utilize effeciently. (the <8" LMB might look great, 10"-16" might be skinny and the 18+" LMB might look great)

I think that might be the case...the non utility forage. I took a few photos but they really didn't come out well I don't think. I have caught a few of the 4 to 5 lb bass earlier and they seem healthy. Nice and fat and very hard fighting. The large head /small body scenario seems to be limited to the 14 to 18 range as I think back. There is no doubt a huge population of redears. Would it be ok to take out a hundred or so? Or should I take fewer out at a time several times? also I noticed a post that says only 50 to 60 bass per acre. If thats the case then the bass are way over populated as well. If you stand there a minute 5 to 8 bass will pass the shore in schools about every 30 seconds or so but they are only about 4 to 10 inches. I spent about 5 hours there yesterday and only saw one bass over the 20 inch mark but saw hundreds of the smaller ones. As suggested earlier...I think I'll just start taking out the bass under 14 inches and the redears under 7 inches. The catch rate for the redears is about 1 every 10 seconds of you can unhook them that fast, and the supply SEEMS unlimited. Unless I have an emergency all stop post I'll begin taking the smaller ones out this weekend. I do however wonder whats the best thing to do with them. Surely someone would like to have them but I don't know who or were and transportation is also an issue I would guess. seems like a boatload of work to fillet 200 small blugill and bass for dinner for 2 haha. Anyway, Heres the pics I did take. If there is a specific view or item that would be helpful to see, let me know and I'll go snap a few more. oop! I guess I'm not familiar with the ways and means to up load photos. Any help there would be appreciated as well. Thanks again folks ,Dan

I don't recall ever hearing of Redear Sunfish (RES) overpopulating in a pond with evn a few predators. RES only spawn once per season. Are you sure you are dealing with RES. Is it possible you are dealing with another species of sunfish, such as Pumpkinseeds?

Also, RES are notoriusly difficult to catch on a hook and line.

Here's the photos ...I think lol.

Try using polarized sunglasses in front of your camera lens to eliminate the glare Dan.

Honestly, anything is possible at this point. lol. I do notice a drastic difference in color between them(the different types of sunfish) some quite dark and some quite light though the lighter ones I just chalked up to being the younger ones as they are also the smaller ones as a rule. As far as I know there are only redears, bass, crappie, and channels.

RES would never provide the forage to feed that many predators. If you can catch and post pictures of the fish, we can identify them quickly for you.

No problems there. I have a long weekend at the cabin planned starting tomorrow so I'll get all types of photos. I noticed when snaping photos yesterday a school of minnows and a school of 2 inch. So the food supply seems to be holding in the smaller end any way. What would a half dozen northern pike do in there?

It is very possible you were stocked originally with Hybrid Bluegill which is very popular in your area. The HBG will reproduce, but the offspring revert back to the Green Sunfish and usually stunt. This could explain your missing a size class of forage.

It is only one of a myriad of potential reasons though.

ahhh. That would also explain the big head/small body in the specific size range of bass as well? correct?

Exactly! HBG offspring often stunt into the 2-4 inch size range.

I think more than ever that you should give Nate Herman a call though. He is in your back yard and has a natural, God given talent, along with a whole lot of work and experience for understanding ponds.

Nate could save you a ton of time and prevent more mistakes. It may save you some big $'s in the long run since the wrong move can take years to correct.

Hold the phone! You said hard to catch? Not these little buggers. Bare hook all day long. Id better get some photos of the fish for comparison before we go any further. As you are describing I think they are HBG not redears.

Indeed! I knew something ugly was going to happen when I saw the stringer of dead cats ol boy was hauling to his truck. I let it set for 2 years and am now seeing the imbalance taking shape. If nothing else id like to just stop the problem then correct it from there. The biggest problem here as far as understanding is that my father in law always took care of this, from inception. I played a fairly large part in it over the few years and then took over after he died but the depth of experience as far as management died with him. I do think I have a good handle on it (until...well ya know) but I certainly don't know it like he did. All you info and knowledge is a god send my friend. If you have Nates contact info I'd be grateful.

Also, I wouldn't pull out any of the sunfish. The LMB are needing things to eat, so taking food off of the plate won't help at all. Thin out any of the skinny LMB, and post pics of what you can from this weekend. Crappie in the pond might be part of the problem.

I second getting Nate out there. What he can do/tell you in a few hours = weeks on the forum.

http://www.hbpondmanagement.com/

Tell him Pond Boss and Rex sent ya.

For what it's worth, I am delivering a truckload of fish to Nate in the next few weeks and I have no doubt we can find room on board for some pure bluegill to fill any empty void you may have.

The Doctor just re-certified my USDOT health certificate and I'm back in business!

WOW!cool resource! Thanks a bunch guys. So I'll take that as an all stop(the bass needing food.) Ultimately I want huge bass and cats and could not really care about the rest of them(other than the balance they provide of course) but I'm not huge BG fisherman. How many bass can my pond support in the5-8 lb range? The cats are growing even quicker than I thought after seeing them come to feed yesterday. I certainly don't want to disturb the cats habitat while trying to fix this whole mess thats for sure.

Hold up, I thought hybrids never reverted back to their original parents' species?

lol I'm not thinking I need any more fish? once I remove the mid range bass won't the cycle start fresh again and the forage will grow with the baby bass? Thus the balance start to level out? What about transfers? If I need to take out a bunch of bass can you send them elsewhere or are they a loss? Good news about the DOT card. I have one of those though I've never really needed it.

Aside from the magazine... which publication is going to give the best overall info? Basic pond management? or something else?