Pond Boss Forums MANAGING AN EXISTING POND Evaluating and adjusting fish populations Yellow perch doing fine?

I was a little worried that the perch were not eating the feed and the minnows were really getting most of it. Well we have thousands and thousands of tadpoles and minnows. My son and I dropped out today to do a bit of fishing to see how the perch are doing.

One of these would you say have a belly full of eggs or just chunky from eating so much. They all were put in as 4-6" in November of last year. Seem to be doing well. Thoughts?

Cheers Don.

What is the water temp?

I don't know off hand. I am guessing in the mid to high 60's right now.

Cheers Don.

They look like well fed healthy perch to me. To late for fecund females if water temp is in the 60's.

I agree with Cecil. If the water is that warm,in photo 1, if those are eggs, they are being reabsorbed. Love those perch! These are my favorite fish!

Healthy plump perch good growth so far. What were your water temperatures of the pond? Often when natural food is abundant some of many of the perch will go "off" feeding on pellets until the natural foods become limited. Are you feeding a pellet that has 40%+ protein?

The water surface temp is mid 70's. All year so far I have not seen the perch at all eating the feed on the surface. Just the minnows we have seen taking the feed. I am sure they are taking the feed because 50% floats and 50% sinks.

There is a huge amount of tad poles. The shore line was just black with them. I am guessing they would be feeding on these. My son last night went out with just two worms and was able to catch and release 13 perch ranging from 4-8"s. Some really plump others long and skinny. Guessing the difference between males and females right now.

There is 1000's of minnows in the pond and tad poles right now. There is no lack of feed.

What feed we are feeding is http://www.martinmills.com/profishent_high_energy.php The pond is doing so so well on this feed. All the animals in the pond are eating up this feed. Right now we are just taking a cup full down twice a day so we really have not gotten them on a feeder. We do feed as best we can on a schedule. The perch were feed trained but with two of three boys in competitive baseball and one sponsored paintballer it is tuff to stick to a schedule.

Cheers Don.

With water temperature of 70F the yellow perch (YP) are done spawning. Spawning of YP is normally complete when water reaches 60F. When the toads are spawning the YP are usually done spawning. I think the difference between the plump and skinny perch is the plump YP are eating pellets and skinny ones are not eating pellets. I commonly see this in ponds with YP. I have seen pellet trained perch that do not eat pellets get thin bodies in a pond with lots of minnows present. It is like they do not know how to catch and eat minnows. I find the YP do not eat or like tadpoles. All perch ponds without bass always have lots of tadpoles esp bullfrog and toad tadpoles. It is okay to only feed your perch once a day and 4 to 6 days a week and they will still grow well.

Bill this is exactly what we are seeing here. I was able to net a few minnows last night. Every fish my son caught with the minnows were the chunky perch. When we went back to the worms we caught some chunky and some thin long slender ones.

I think the fat ones are getting the minnows and the thin ones are not getting much at all to eat. I am not getting any top feeding from the perch on the feed we are putting into the pond. It is so hard to know if they are taking the feed or just the minnows are taking it all up.

I understand it may take time for the perch to get use to the pond but they have been in there since November. Water temp is rising to the point the boys can catch one on every cast. I hope they are eating the feed just I can't see that they are.

Cheers Don.

Don, if the minnows are eating the feed, the perch are eating it too, but indirectly.

If you got such amount of minnows then why do you feed your perch with those pellets? Perch is an effective predator and it should succesfully "switch" from pellets to minnows.

Maintaing the minnow numbers is going to be the issue. I have a feeling in a couple years, he won't have anymore minnows. As the minnows he stocked were emerald shiners and they are not going be able to maintain their population in his pond. Plus, when fish are pellet trained, you can up the biomass your pond supports. In my opinion, utilizing a quality pellet feeding program along with correct aeration is like doubling the size of your pond at least in the amount of fish it can support.

Plus like Bill said, the YP aren't chasing pellets all over the pond; expending less calories per mouthful, so they'll put on weight faster.

Ya these little buggers can eat you out of house and home. I understand that if you don't sublament some feed as well they will out eat the minnow stock faster then they can populate.

There is a golden shiner in the pond as well with the emerald shiners that were part of the first 10,000 we put in. I thought that the emerald shiners may have spawned in the pond but just not 100% on that just yet. It looks like they must have because of the small size of the shiners.

See I may need another fall and spring spawn of the minnows before they really take to the pond. If the emerald shiners don't really populate I will be leaning on the golden shiners more.

This is a brand new pond as well so there is little to about 5% cover for the minnows. I have under estimated how aggressive these perch are to minnows wow.

Cheers Don.

I think some of the emerald shiners originally stocked were smaller than you realized. It is too early in the season for you to have had them spawn this year with as far north as you are and then reach the size you describe.