Pond Boss Forums STOCKING A NEW POND Raising Forage and Bait My Pondweed/Grass Shrimp Relationship

What about a pond with 2-4" in. BG and 3-5" CC?

It all comes down to qty and habitat. If you have submergent vegetation and stock enough I think you'd be fine. Depends on how serious you are about getting them established. 100 GS in a pond full of voracious BG and no habitat is recipe for failure. Need to know more about your bow to make recommendation.

One of the biggest factors in survival success is water chemistry... If you water is soft with few dissolved solids they most likely will not take hold not matter what. If it is usually turbid(muddy) again, they aren't going to do well.

Rocky areas with 1/4" to 1/2" crevices and vegetation are both great structure and escape cover for grass shrimp.

If you have a pond with the right chemistry, which most pond owners on here will along with the above mentioned habitat, you should strongly consider stocking some.

After stocking grass shrimp a couple years ago from Fattig into a 0.4 acre pond, I hadn't seen signs of them. Admittedly I hadn't been really looking as I have left the pond where I had stocked them alone just allowing the forage fish breed for a couple years before stocking other fish.

This year was my planned year to begin adding actual fish I could fish for into it so I have been sampling it to see where my forage fish populations were at. I had honestly thought my grass shrimp didn't take hold. Today I proved myself wrong. Just sitting on the edge of the pond watching into the shallows with polarized lenses for a couple minutes I was able to spot nearly 2 dozen grass shrimp scooting around. This pond doesn't have ideal habitat as it has no aquatic vegetation.

However, last year it was getting over run with some willows so I cut them down and then sunk them into the shallow areas in piles for added cover. The trunks and branches are now covered in algae and grass shrimp! The shrimp appear to be using the intertwined limbs as cover, feeding on the organisms growing in the algae. I'm glad to see my grass shrimp have taken hold. They'll be a huge part of my food chain as my game fish begin get added.

Do you have some pics of your grass shrimp you could post? What do you have in the pond now and what do you plan to add to it?

I didn't catch any, I just observed them in the water so no pictures. Perhaps tomorrow I will do some more surveying of the pond and may come across some shrimp and will get a few photos.

Currently I have banded killifish, lake chubsuckers, satinfin shiners, spotfin shiners, spottail shiners, bluntnose minnows, eastern mudminnows, tessellated darters and bluespotted sunfish in the pond and I recently stocked golden shiners and fathead minnows.

I'll be stocking RES, RBS, SMB and possibly WE and already have a handful of all male BG.

CJ with lack of better habitat and after you stock sportfish and they reproduce your chances of long term survival of the GShrimp are low. One of the reasons you are seeing numerous ones is the lack of predators. Panfish that are targeting GS in a few brushy areas have low chances of breeders surviving until spawning. Grass shrimp have an annual cycle where adults die each year and are replaced by offspring. It will be interesting to see how they survive in your small pond after stocking of panfish predators.

Yeah, TJ and I were talking about that exact thing via PM. With there being no vegetation, it will most likely be an issue. Until I get the duckweed completely under control adding vegetation is an issue as I am using fluridone to handle the duckweed and any vegetation added would simply be killed by the fluridone. Hopefully I can get the duckweed controlled and then can get suitable vegetation introduced before my sportfish ravage my GS population.

If that doesn't happen the only other factor that may help me is one side of the pond was left with willow trees. They have extremely thick root masses and go out into 2-3 feet of water. Most of that side of the pond is very shallow. Over 6 feet out and it only gets about 2 feet deep. There are extensive areas of 6" or less of water. I observed a fair number of grass shrimp utilizing this maze of roots in extremely shallow water. It will be interesting in the end to see if aquatic vegetation is truly needed for grass shrimp to be successful under predation.

So both the GS and the lake chub suckers once seemed to be gone but turned out to be thriving. Very cool.

You mention RBS; where are you sourcing them? Found a hatchery, or from the bucket?

Yes, granted I really haven't been watching the pond that closely. This year I have been heavily sampling and observing it. I am happy to see both the LCS and GS have taken hold.

The only hatchery sources I've been able to locate are down in GA and the Carolinas. I am making a trip down south to bring my new baby to see family next month. I'll be picking up some while down there. Still working on which hatchery as there are a few options. Been looking at Owen and Williams but am not sold just yet. Here are what the golden color morph RBS look like.




I'll most likely stock 50/50 golden morph and regular coloration.

Those are some neat fish, would love to have some of them in my pond.

The habitat and cover of the willow roots along one shoreline will definately benefit the grass shrimp. The use of fluridone herbicide may eventually kill the willows.?

I've been told different things as to whether the willows will die or not... I guess I am gonna find out.

Experience is a very good teacher. If the willows die it may depend on several things. Usually it always depends.

They do a pretty good job of dying when I spray the trunks with 1:3 Remedy/diesel.

diesel???? in your pond?????

Yes; I don't worry about the small amount of diesel and chemicals. It has always dispersed with no apparent problem. Think about it. One inch of water over one acre is 27,000 gallons. When I do the math I find that the small amount of "pollutants" is pretty insignificant. A quart or less of the mix goes a long way.

My disclaimer is that it has never hurt my pond nor any others that I've treated.

Willow infestation, OTOH, can be much more of a problem.

When you say willows you talking cat tails?

No, willow trees.

Glad to see Fattig's has its website back up. RockvilleMDAngler just reported receiving an order with zero morts on his construction/stocking thread.

Yes, I saw it was back up as well... People really should strongly look at stocking grass shrimp into their ponds. Especially if sunfish are their goal. Even ponds aimed at quality bass will benefit from them. No downside to stocking them.

I am suprised they do not market the golden morph red breast more "even on their own site" those are really cool. I would like some also.