Pond Boss Forums MANAGING AN EXISTING POND Corrective stocking Can I stock too many Bluegill

I know you can but im just curious of what you guys think. I have a 1/3 acre CNBG growout pond that i've been using these past 2 years to supply a 7 acre lake that had pretty low numbers.

These past two years we've pulled out lots of native bass and put in ~7000 2-6" CNBG along with 35 12-15" pure florida bass that i grow also in other ponds.

With that being said, the bass in general in the lake have shown a big improvement in health. I started feeding about midway through this year and looks like i now finally have a decent population on BG from 1" all the way to 8". My 3-4" BG population seems to be struggling the most but we'll see what it looks like next year.

Im thinking my CNBG pond yeilds about 5000 2-6" fish a year with my feeding rate. I usually do about 3-4 fish moves a year.

As long as i don't see some bad affects of this next year, is there a problem with doing this every year if Big Bass is my goal for this pond?

Im wouldn't doubt it if i lose half the fish i put in to predation, so adding 3500 fish or 1750 per year might not be bad to enhance the forage...

What is the size structure of the bass in the 7 acre pond?

Last year we pulled out 15 lbs to the acre of 10-18".

This year we pulled out 10 lbs per acre (seemed to catch less fish this year), everthing less than 18" pretty much again. This year i saw a more diverse size class of fish. We see bass from 6-20+". Also they were a lot healthier looking.

So to answer your question, without a shock survey i'd say the bass size class are spread out fairly decent.

You noticed your 3-4 inch class getting hit the hardest. I would stock the class they are eating... 3-4 .

Well today was my last move for the season. I had a little problem with my lift net but we caught ~750 2-6" regardless. Pretty even distribution on the mix, lots of each size class.. all looking very fat via the aquamax 400.

any other info on the process, thanks in advance

Same thing for next year. Gather as much info on the big lake starting in spring. RW on LMB , look for BG 3-4 inches , look for BG beds and results. Sounds to me like you are about half way to being where you want to be. Are you feeding in the big lake ? If not start in the spring.

Chad,
Weigh and measure every bass you get your hands on, regardless of whether or not you remove it. Compare EVERY bass to standard weights for that size class.
As you do what you are doing, you'll see a shift in relative weights, one way or another.
That will tell you whether what you are doing is working or not.
The direct answer to your question in this thread is, "No, you can't stock too many bluegill" into that environment.
Worst-case scenario, regarding that question, is if you over-harvest your bass...then you could POSSIBLY become bluegill-heavy. If so, you can move some larger bass from your other ponds to re-balance.

Boudro say, "set dee blasting cap for seeks foot."

Thanks for the info, I was kind of thinking the same thing... as long as i was stocking a large variation of sizes of CNBG, that would keep me from overstocking a particular size.

Also I started feeding middle of this summer, but next year i'll feed the whole growing season, The dam of the lake is about 250-300yds long and being that its on my way home, i stop everyday and walk down it and broadcast the feed across the entire 250-300yrds.

I've done a lot of WR's on fish in other ponds and got fairly decent at judging the WR of the fish. I can say they easily went up 5-10% from last year. The majority of the fish this year we caught were in the 90's. I'm anxious to see next year's results.

Chad,

It sounds like your hard work is paying off. Keep up the good work.

Taking a few pictures and posting them also helps the experts determine more quickly. I know that when I ask questions about my fish, I try to add a few because they answer more questions than I do.

I am no expert, but it sounds like you are well on your way to having a great fishing spot, I can't wait to se some pics!