Pond Boss Forums STOCKING A NEW POND Types of fish to choose Stocking a new pond with RES, YP and SMB

Yes, precisely why they aren't commercially available. Since I perform a lot of due diligence for my small business, I might have more tolerance for wading through details compared to others. Bottom line is pondmeisters with small gape predators need access to these fish, and at $6 a pop I'm going to try and help resolve the supply and demand issues.

http://i1065.photobucket.com/albums/u392/JamieE38/469cbf3e68f2465171466940428d6dba.jpg

Google earth recently updated showing my new pond. Couldn't of ask for better timing! Pic shows all the rock structure that was added and the under water ridges. The detail in this pic will be very valuable to us in the future!

Clear water is nice for showing underwater structure. You are fortunate the timing was correct.

Very fortunate Bill; however the water is clear enough to see alot of this structure anyway. I am starting to be able to see structure that is at least 4' under the surface, but a lot of it is deeper than this so the pic will be helpful in locating those areas.

I was really kind of kicking myself for not hiring someone in a plane to get a shot showing the layout of the pond before it filled. Amazingly Google earth came through for me... Sometimes better to be lucky then good, I guess...

I have a few pics of fish to ID, but the pics aren't real good. I hope to get better pics in the next few days as we've been seeing some different looking fish showing up to feed. I'm hoping to figure out what has successfully spawned in the pond so far this season. I'm going to be setting the minnow trap in order to get some samples of what's swarming the pier every night when we feed. We have some fish feeding on the pellets that are 6-7" long already. The GSH are doing really well, but there appears to be another fish in the mix coming to pellets. A couple of these appear to be the largest fish of the bunch... Could this be LCS eating pellets? I thought they were primarily bottom feeders... ?

http://i1065.photobucket.com/albums/u392/JamieE38/d7d77f84206600260f5f88d2df0174f8.jpg

http://i1065.photobucket.com/albums/u392/JamieE38/757174ce40b57a98e58714b5c9ee51f0.jpg

Also a pic of one of the GSH I found dead on the bank and the swarm of minnows we see every night when we feed.

http://i1065.photobucket.com/albums/u392/JamieE38/3a9c00726c24234d129add9fef3757d7.jpg

http://i1065.photobucket.com/albums/u392/JamieE38/69db1ffa43ab7624b2bb6f021a10d76a.jpg

Strongly considering buying the 4-5" feed trained Yoy, YP that Cecil has for sale, but I'm not sure it's a good idea to stock them just yet... I've had FHM, GSH and LCS in the pond since April. There is a lot of the GSH that are 5"+, and I've been seeing LCS that range from 3-6" feeding nightly on pellets. There seems to be mobs of FHM all the way around the pond. I also just stocked 3500 paper shell crayfish that were only in the 2-4" range.

My question is how much of an impact would 500-600 feed trained Yoy YP in the 4-5" range be in my 3 acre pond? Sounds like they are very well trained on pellets... How many FHM would they consume over the winter months?

I was looking at fall of 2015 to stock YP and SMB. Thanks for any advice.

Guys don't be afraid to nix Jamie from planting them if you believe it's not a good idea. I honestly don't know. Jamie also wants to know if these fish will spawn in the spring at one year if age if planted this fall. I honestly don't know that either.

I recommend getting Cecil genetics in your pond ASAP. He's been selectively breeding these YP for generations - I'd be exceedingly proud/lucky to have some out here in NE.

I do not believe the qty or size of YP will impact your forage base at all. First, they will continue to focus on pellets which relieves stress from your forage base. Next, consider the gape of a 4-5" YP - can probably barely fit an AM 600 pellet, let alone do much damage on your forage base. A 2" FHM isn't skinny and I think it would be quite a mouthful for a 4-5" YP.

I would stock the YP now while you have access to Cecil genetics - never know what the supply will be next year as fish raising success is far from certain and many factors come to play annually - most of them unforeseen or out of our control.

In regards to spawning - I had 6" gravid females and 5" males milting this Spring - so I think a spawn could happen for you. Recruitment creates an additional, abundant forage base from which the SMB stocking in the Fall of 2015 will benefit. I would not be concerned with YP population management - my SMB, WE and HSB manage my populations TOO well.

Jamie, I second getting the YP. BUT, what I'd do if it was my pond is get busy building cages and throw all the YP in cages until next Fall. If they lay egg skeins this coming spring, pick them out of the cages. That way you'll have them when you want to put them in the pond. Cecil can walk you thru the caging 'em process. He's done it once or twice.

If you need floats for the cages, I have a number of empty 2 1/2 gallon Cutrine Plus containers.....

Jamie,

Be aware overwintering fish in cages can be risky. I've had good luck and I've had very bad luck where every fish in the cage died.

Why should he cage them? I assume he doesn't want recruitment? But, why not? YP YOY won't impact his forage base IMO...guess I'm missing something.

For this situation with "I've had FHM, GSH and LCS in the pond since April." there will be no problem of adding the pellet trained 4"-6" YP this fall. Actually they could have been added when the minnows were added in April. After a summer of FHM spawning there will be very high numbers of YOY FHM. The pellet YP (4"-6") will not significantly impact the FHM population since this size of stocker pellet eating YP will not eat a lot of FHM and the ones they do eat will primarily be 3/4"-1.5" during ice cover and early spring 2015. This leaves the larger FHM for next years breeding season. I have experienced this numerous times previously.

If the pellet trained YP were added in April-May this year and fed pellets there would still be lots of FHM this fall and next spring for brood stock spawning. As long as the YP are fed pellets the FHM will be abundant until the 1st or 2nd spawn of YP recruits are adults and they will then be eating significant amounts of minnows. Youngster YP (1"-3") will also feed fingerling or juvenile SMB. You will likely not see FHM disappear from this pond until the SMB have spawned the first time. By then the other forage GSH, LCS together with YOY YP will be the main forage fish of adult YP and SMB.

Expect at least some of the stocker 4"-6" YP to spawn in 2015 at one year old which frequently happens with well fed, well growing one year old YP. By the end of 2015, one year from now, Jamie should be seeing 8" to maybe a few 10" YP especially if pellets are fed. At end of year two 10" to 12" YP should be common. Keep us advised of your progress. Let's see how close I come to being correct.

I was just thinking that if they were released into the pond, they probably will pull off at least a partial spawn in the spring. Not a big deal if SMB are available next year, but it might lead to too many YP in the pond if SMB aren't available.

Bill has taught me well.

Since the YP considered are still young and 2015 will be their first spawn, the spawn will be limited and small since the egg masses will be small and not abundant. Also with adult GSH present expect to have some or numerous YP fry become food for GSH.

Thanks guys for your input, its much appreciated... Now to get ahold of Cecil and get hooked up on some YP.

Please keep us informed on how your pond advances. Great combo of fish.

I'll be sure to do that Bob. Any bit of future success I may have with the pond will be a direct result of all the very knowledgable, willing to help individuals on this site.

I do have a few up dates with some pics to ad to this thread when I get the extra time. I actually made the 8 hour trip to smith creek in New York to get a truck load of crayfish. The pickup was loaded down with boxes of Crayfish including the back seat of my crew cab.

Tomorrow afternoon I'll be lucky enough to add 500 of Cecil's YP that possess some awesome genetics to the pond! I'm pretty excited about that!

Jamie:

How many papershells was that?

What habitat do you have in the pond for them?

Essup, there was supposed to be 3000 papershells in 15 boxes at 200 to a box. I counted a couple of the boxes and there were on average an extra 50 per box so Im estimating 3750. I also added some from the creek to bring the total to close to 4000.

You can see the structure I added in this thread in the pics back on page 1. Also the areal pic at the top of this page. Its a mix of concrete, rip rap and gravel. The gravel is all the way around the pond and ranges in size from 3" to 8" with most of it being in between those 2 sizes. Its only about 3' wide however. Given the smaller size of this gravel i didnt expect much use by the cray fish but they seem to disappear in it quite well.

We added about 140 ton of large concrete chunks that were dumped in 20 ton piles in 8-13' of water scattered around the pond.

The rip rap I got cheap from a local quarry and its a mix of gravel all the way up to chunks as big as a truck hood, but most of it is 6-12" chunks. This rock was dumped in 15 different piles about 50-100' apart all the way around the banks of the pond. Each pile was 10-20 ton of rip rap. After dumping the rip rap into piles I pushed the piles out perpendicular to the banks and connecting several of them to the larger piles of concrete in deep water. So the rip rap ended up being kind of an under water peninsula 10' to 20' wide and 30' long by a couple feet deep.

In addition to this Ive picked up some used concrete chunks from here and there and have covered about 75'long strip of bank by about 8'wide on a western point. Also have scattered out several small stacks of concrete on the south side in between some of the rip rap peninsulas.

I think were up to 650+ ton of rock added thus far. I just hope its enough to sustain a good number of crayfish for a long term forage for the SMB.

Where'd you get your LCS from?

That will be excellent Crayfish habitat!!!

CJ, got them from Zimmerman. Essup, think I'll be able to maintain a viable population of crayfish with SMB present? I sure hope so with the effort I've put in.

Well, got the YP from Cecil put into the pond today. Wow, I can't believe the size of those fish and how fat they were... Great fish at a very fair price and he even delivered for a more than fair price. The numbers were a little lower than what we thought, but we still got 420 YP and that's a great start!

Nice to meet you today Cecil and Thanks for making the run down to Bluffton, it's much appreciated!

Thank you for the business Jamie. I aso now have room in the tanks in the basement for about a thousand bluegill. Nice to meet you, your wife, and son.

Gorgeous pond too at 3 acres. I was starting to wonder If it was really three acres as all the ponds I was passing on the way to yours were about 1/20th acre. LOL But it's definitely three acres!

With all those rocks there, I think so. Especially if you get pellet trained SMB and feed 'em.