Pond Boss Forums INTRO Questions & Observations How Big?

With all I've read about how difficult it can be to establish a Golden Shiners base, or to control a population of Gizzard Shad, I'm wondering if it is really worth it. I live too far north for Threadfins (souther VA). "Assuming" my 8 acre LMB/Bluegill/channel cat lake well managed, aerated, balanced and fertilized, how large can I reasonably expect my LMB to grow? I understand that there are still a lot of variables; but without Shad or Shiners, at what weight can I expect the LMB growth to stop?

I have seen bass grow to 10 pounds in ponds with no shad. The only time I have seen this is when the owner harvests bass from the pond.

Note: where catch and release is strictly enforced you rarely see a bass over 8 pounds.

Shan O'Gorman
Pro Ponds

In local small northern OH ponds I occassionally see 23"-24"(7-8 Lb). Often LMB top out around here at 18"-22" 3.5 to 6 Lbs with just sunfish and smaller bass as forage.
Managing a pond for trophy LMB is more difficult than managing for big bgills. The pond must be carefully managed and harvested to routinely produce one or maybe several trophy LMB per acre. Once the trophy is removed conditions have to be just right for another fish to grow and take that big fishs' place.
I think having channel catfish in a pond with LMB will compete w/ the LMB and reduce the number of large bass that can be supported in the pond. Assuming the catfish are not artifically fed.

When attempting to raise trophy bass one has to keep in mind at least two things. Several other mgmt techniques are also very important. Maybe someone else can elaborate on them or expand on these two.

1. A pond will only grow just SO many lbs of bass (predators) per acre. Fertility determines this. This bass poundage does not mean one size of bass, but it has to be distributed among numerous size classes or groups of bass; from fingerlings to those largest fish in the pond. If other predator species are in the pond these will compete & detract from the LMB total poundage.

For example a fertile pond can support about 40-50 lbs bass/ac. if we have ideal conditions: 1-10 lb, 1-8 lb, 2-6 lb, & 4-3 lb, 8-1 lb thats 50 lbs of LMB and no bass less than 1 pound have been counted. Bass smaller than one lb need to be fairly numerous (10%-20% or more of the total LMB wt i.e. 10-20 lbs/ac) to balance out the system and provide adequate young to compensate for LMB mortality and importantly to thin the young of very prolific bgill. Overabundance of starving small bgill will prevent LMB from successfully spawning by eating LMB eggs and fry.

So that means we have to reduce the number of bass between 1 lb and 10 lb. Which ones do you want to remove? Many ponds will not support 50 lbs of LMB per acre without fertilization and proper mgmt. Thus w/out fertilization our hypothetical bass population above has to be reduced even more, maybe to as low as 15 to 25 lbs/ac. WOW! How do you want to reduce the bass numbers? Which ones should we remove?. Do you begin to see how difficult it becomes to have numerous trophy bass per acre. Five 10 lb bass per acre is 50Lbs.! Doubt that is even naturally possible. Large bass are truly a rare item & difficult to produce.

2. LMB change behavior and diet items when they start getting bigger than 16"-18". See B. Lusk's 'Raising Trophy Bass' book. So to get the bass to grow from 5 lbs to larger sizes it becomes very importqant to have proper numbers and proper sizes of forage fish. So you not only have to properly manage the bass density and numbers but also pay close attention to the forage populations.

Many ponds produce a few big trophy bass; this probably often occurs more often by luck or accident than by skill of the pondowner.

Bill, another well written post. If adding another predator fish in small numbers eg. catfish, SMB or walleye, etc. how will this detract from the LMB total poundage in both the fertile and less fertile pond. In your past posts with my specific waters you truely opened by eyes to adding other predator fish within this restricted biomass.

Rowly

Rowly - I'm not sure of what you meant by fertile and less fertile in relation to detracting from the total LMB poundage. I will try with this answer.

Fertile will grow more lbs of predator per acre than a less fertile pond. Primarily,, fertile grows more panfish or forage fish/acre. The more panfish or forage fish you have per acre the more predators you can support. Ideally you want the predators to consume about 30% to 50% of the forage each year. On another topic but still about predator-prey. Pheasants Forever and Upland game managers say it takes about 15 acres of grass cover to support each pair of pheasants. WOW! Think how many acres it takes then to support a coyote or large hawk that preys on pheasants; quite a few acres. It needs to eat more than two pheasants per year!.

It's somewhat more complex than this but I am going to oversimplify this for ease of understanding so here goes......
Each predator, what ever the species, needs to eat. The pond contains or produces just so much predator food or forage/acre. The predator food has to be split or divided among the predators present. If a pond gets too many predators some will not get enough food and growth slows down or can even stop.

So a pond can have for example- 18 predators per acre. 18 can be 18 largemouth. Or 9 largemouth and 9 larger catfish. Or 8 bass, 6 walleye, & 4 lg. cats. All total 18. Each different type of predator even when added in small numbers to an existing predator base has to share the food with the other ones.

What would happen if we put 3 coyote per 15 acres in the example above? The added predators in a pond cannot swim out or leave and eat somewhere else. If all the predators are stocked initially together it becomes survival of the fittest. And if one stocks too many,, they over eat the existing forage fishes and overall growth slows down because most are not getting enough to eat; stunting results.

A few predators that are maybe larger or more aggresive might be able to continue to grow because they are feeding on something the majority of predators are not able to eat; maybe something too big to swallow for the others. Or he may even resort to eating another smaller predator which does often happen!

If you add a predator to a pond full of predators the new one has to be able to find enough food to not just survive, but to hopefully grow. What if the new guy is not as competitive as the older already established predators? New guy may not fair so well. If he out competes the old guys then the old guys come up short. See someone suffers from lack of food, if there is not enough food to go around and make everyone grow. When some of the predators reproduce things get more crowded and more competition for food results. When there is a food shortage it first affects growth then it affects reproduction by decreasing or stopping it.

You also have to consider if the predator has to expend all his energy chasing sparse, improper sized food he eats too little and excercises too much and does not gain weight.
Did I make any sense & answer your question adequately?

hey Bill,
I really appreciate you taking the time to answer my question and your post was filled with alot of good information, but that is not really what I was asking.

When I was reading "Raising Trophy Bass" by Bob Lusk one thing that stood out in my mind was that he said every single managed pond with 10+ lbs. bass in it had shad for a major forrage. The filter-feeding habits of shad creates a shorter food chain thus more total biomass and their shape alows the bass to swallow a bigger meal. So according to Mr. Lusk with out shad the maximum size of the bass in my pond is under 10 lbs.

My question is not so much about total lbs of preditor fish per acre according to how much food is avalible but more about the maximum size of each fish depending on the species of the primary forrage. In other words, what is the maximum size a largemouth bass can obtain with bluegill as the main food source as opposed to gizzard or thredfin shad (all else being equal)?

Thanks for the info and sorry for the misunderstanding

I have a pond that had NO SHAD and it produced numerous bass 10+. It is possible. The pond was actually under harvested and lacked any kind of management. They probably were getting big by eating small bass.
I started managing this pond in 1996 and I introduced fertilizer and threadfin shad. The average bass went from 1lb to 2.8lbs. in three years. Last year I introduced GIZZARD Shad because I had a lake full of 16"+ bass.
I'm excited about this year. I can't wait to see what difference the gizzard shad make.
I say all that to say that I wouldn't recommend trying to grow big bass w/o shad but to say that a 10lb+ bass can't be grown w/o shad is incorrect.
(I also know other ponds that have grown 10lb+ bass w/o shad) I think the thing is that you can't do it consistantly year after year w/o a good shad program. My opinion of course.

david do you anticipate any problems with gizzard shad over the long run? Also, you are in Texas - was your pond spring fed and clear? What did you fertilize with? Do you feed also?

I have seen 10#+ lmb in a 2 ac farm pond. There have been some whopper bass caught in unattended farm ponds though there usually aren't very many per pond.

Tim, I do everything that a person can do. Yes, my water was very clear and I started fertilizing heavy in 1996. Originally it was spring fed but the springs have clogged up to the point that they don't impact the water level.
Gizzard shad...yes, I tossed and turned over that issue for a couple of years. Then I decided to roll the dice and see what happens. I have not removed a bass over 16" since 1996 and never intend to remove one again ever, so I think the Gizzard shad will be a good mix. One major factor that made me go this way was that Bob Lusk said ever true trophy bass pond that he manages has them.

The part of the country a person lives in has a huge influence in how big of a LMB can be grown. In SD, our state record isn't even 10 lbs.

I have several ponds less than three acres under management in north Texas which have produced 12+ pound largemouth bass without shad. But, they are rare, and population dynamics are usually out of whack quickly if we don't stay on top of management issues.
We supplementally feed floating fish food to forage fish, fertilize at the right time, and cull just the right number of intermediate size bass. These landowners work at growing large bass.