Pond Boss Forums MANAGING AN EXISTING POND Evaluating and adjusting fish populations Pond Temp..51 degrees..Bye Tilapia

I should be seeing some floaters in the next couple of days.

I finally saw mine last Saturday. A few were dead but most were almost dead so I dipped up some big ones and revived them. I put them in my overwintering tank and ate the worse off ones. Sunday there were 3 more and Monday there was one dead. I think that was it.

Up here along the Red River, my tilapia died about three weeks ago. I had them in three different ponds. One pond, heavy with bass, I saw no dead tilapia, the second pond had several tilapia almost two pounds each, and I saw them lying on the bottom in water three feet deep. The third pond had no other fish. It is a small production pond we seined six times. About two hundred fish escaped the net and perished. Buzzards made short work of the remainders which a great blue heron didn't get as they died.

Seems like there was an article a few years ago in Pond Boss which said if you have predators in the pond w/Tilapia, you will not see many, if any, dead Tilapia, but if you do not have predators you can expect to see thousands of dead Tilapia.

Guess what happens to the Tilapia in your predator based ponds? Be careful, pond meisters, or your predators will get too large.

I need to take temps again.....still no floaters. The only Tilapia I expect to see will be in the 2-3# range.

My pond was 50 degrees at 12" depth......still no floaters. LMB really look healthy!

Three quick hits...

1) I fear my predators are getting too large from the dieoff, I do not see any tilapia when they perish ! And, I have a LOT of predators !

2) There's a blue heron mystery here...

3) Ponds without predators should have Millions of dead fish, not Thousands...do the math, or lookup the old reproduction thread

I have only had a few die off. I went out last week in a boat and still saw several large schools of them.

When I had my die off last year from the severe cold they it was to fast and they were way to big for most of the predetors.

TEXAS715,

I hope you pass through long enough to receive my thanks...I've been dealing with Kenneth Henneke for some large brooder Tilapia to stock in my experimental overwintering system. I'm completely impressed with his set up, his approach to customer service, and his willingness to help me on that project. I want to thank you very much for that recommendation.

Now if I don't kill his fish, by spring I should have boatloads of Tilapia for pond stocking...but that is a very big if right now. Thanks again for your help.

p.s. If it hadn't been for that early Dec. cold snap around here, I'd still have Tilapia in outside ponds also. Water temps have stayed at or above 60 degrees ever since then.

Meadowlark.. I still have a few that just floated this week.. But I have no LMB or catfish.
I plan on stocking this pond with Catfish this spring

Really? That is most interesting...maybe I spoke too soon and still have some myself. I did see several vultures on a pond bank a couple of days ago but didn't think much about it thinking the Tilapia were all gone.

Are you still running well water to try to help keep pond temps up? Wonder if that actually may be helping, contrary to what I predicted. Very interesting, indeed. Do you happen to know your current water temp?

I will check my water temp again, but I have not seen any sign of live Tilapia for about 3 weeks. I do have some 2" CNBG from a late spawn swimming around.

I gave up on the well water idea after my first massive die-off.. I checked the surface water temp. 01/04/07.. 50 degrees

LoopTech,

I checked yesterday and confirmed what you reported earlier...a new Tilapia floater indicating to me that some indeed have survived the early Dec. cold and also indicating the possibility exists that I may have some others that continue to survive in the 20 to 25 foot water depths. This is the longest mine have lasted into the cold temp periods.

I believe it is very possible, with the aid of a supplemental Tilapia production system, to have year around economical(i.e. highly affordable) Tilapia forage in my ponds. If the mild winters continue, a supplemental re-stocking two or three times in the balmy periods after the winter cold snaps would enable a year-around forage base of Tilapia. The occasional cold snaps simply provide a great mechanism to keep the overall population and size of the Tilapia in check. Its a system I'm trying to get in place this winter and perfect as soon as possible.

ML and LT,

My water temp is back at 52 degrees after all the rain. I believe I lost all my Tilapia in December. I counted what probably equaled 80%(over 2 week period) of the Tilapia stockers that I put in last May. Good news ..... all the youngsters became forage!

LT & BarO,

A couple of new floaters this morning in deepest...probably the last of my outdoor Tilapia this season. Because they survived this long, the longest yet, they must have been in the deepest water during the earlier cold snaps.

Even with the cold that we have had I went out and saw several schools in the shallows where the well water is coming in. This will make three years since the only stocking of 100 Tilapia.

My die off last year had to number in the thousands.

I haven't seen a Tilapia since December.

Tx715, I wonder why you had so many Tilapia left last year to die off. My predators get all but the original stockers that were 2-3#'s when they succombed to the cold. I didn't even see one floater less than 12" in the last 2 years.

I got really cold here for about todays, in the teens. I think it come on so fast most had no chance. All of them were also 12" or bigger. some survived and have since repopulated.