Pond Boss Forums INTRO Questions & Observations Placing branches down for YP spawn

There is a pond near me with only mixed sex YP that are heavily dependent on pellets where the rare large FHM manages to survive each year; Emphasis on few. Structure is sparse. I have introduced BNM to that pond and they have noticeably higher density than the FHM.

My FHM population persists entering season 2 in 1/3 ac pond with 80 f YP and 100 m BG with zero vegetation [due to crayfish] heavy supplemental feeding with pellets. I will restock 5G [5,000-8,000] FHM annually regardless as they are readily available and somewhat affordable in order to keep population viable, hopefully. Only 1 season isn't enough time to determine if original stocking could persist. Am adding BNM ASAP. Note - most of the larger FHM [2"+] appear to have been extirpated - very few are seen - population consists of mainly smaller fish according to visual evidence under 2" size.

extirpated???


that gets the award for the word of the day for sure!!

Great work on observing that for me. That may work in my pond as well. I think my source for FHM sells by pound not gallon so I'll have to have him count them out now to be sure I have 5000 minnows

I don't know if the perch can live on shiners alone. Right now it is very rare to catch a fat head minnow in our minnow trap but are right full of shiners. This year we do have some emerald shiner recruitment again. Andrew netted some 1.5" ones the other day.




The Emerald shiners are doing well but nothing like the common shiners. This year there are minnows all around the pond but have had luck netting a few emeralds but expect most of them are common shiners.

There is very little places for minnows to hind in our pond. Just rocks all around and a small branch pile. Our crayfish and common shiners are doing the best then the emerald shiners next. FHM are few and far between with young perch numbering in the 1-5 or the original stocked perch. We have never been able to trap young perch in the minnow trap over night ever yet. We are going to make a bigger trap are go at it a bit different this year.

The visibility never gets better than 24"s ever. I expect the young hatched in our pond perch are the ones picking off the FHM. We still pellet feed about 100#'s per year and do see some small perch feeding on the pellets as well as the shiners.

With the perch spawning the spring of 2013 in our pond (thought it was toilet paper in the pond) I expect they have spawned every year since too. I wonder if the large shiners are putting pressure on the young perch limiting the young?

Cheers Don.

I think larger YP hit the small ones pretty hard. I have a lot of YP feeding on pellets right now but I haven't seen any small enough to be from last year's spawn. I still have a lot of small FHM and will stock more this spring. Visibility im my pond is always low, 8" or less, and I rarely see large FHM even after they are stocked. I catch a few large FHM in the minnow trap but I only remember ever catching 2 or 3 YP in the trap.

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With the perch spawning the spring of 2013 in our pond (thought it was toilet paper in the pond) I expect they have spawned every year since too.

Cheers Don.
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HA! I love your story about thinking the neighbors came and TP-ed your pond!!

WE had a steady all night and all day rain. The pond is turbid and up about 8". I may still stock some next week and just see. They aren't that pricey locally here.

Still no TP in my pond, but it is cold, rainy and the water is stirred up. Tomorrow a nicer day, I'll be checking temps and watching for eggs.

Still early for us Canyon Creek. I've only seen one egg ribbon so far and saw no deflated females when I seined, and I'm a little farther south than you are.

30 degrees this morning, with a 19 windchill and there was about 3/8" of snow on roofs, cars and everything else except the ground.

I am wondering if I will see any more egg ribbons. I am not sure any of the first ones were fertile.

I was still seeing new ones at least 10 days after I saw the first one. I'm not sure many of the ones I saw will actually produce. The first ones had practically dissolved by the time I left, last Sunday. There were some individual eggs (or dots) within the ribbons that really were bright, I assumed those were the most likely to hatch. I put out the wrong type branches though. Hopefully I'll get the same number of ribbons next year, but have them in a better position (on better branches) to get a better hatch.

Cecil,
I guess I spoke too soon! I had trees in all sides of the pond but of course the first egg strand goes in on top of the leaves and about 5' away from any tree. It is exactly on the south pole of the pond in surprisingly shallow water (maybe 10"?) Probably where the water was warmest.

I rechecked temps and it is 50 or 50.1 degrees on both sides of the pond and over the site where the eggs were. None of the trees have strands and this is the only free floating one.

Wrap or weave that ribbon around a branch to keep it off the bottom. It will hatch better if off the bottom.

Thanks Bill, I may do that. But for now since my pond is small and I have 100 5-8" perch, I'm not sure I want all the egg strands to stay in the pond and hatch. Although I certainly think it would be neat to have some young perch make it and do their own growing and spawning. Now all of a sudden I have to make pond management decisions

No predators but I'm sure next year I'll put some in or late fall. Thinking about a few SMB.

I'll see how many other egg strands I see over the next few days/weeks.

Bill, any idea what is a average hatch from a ribbon? (In a natural setting.)
The reason I ask is, I must have ended up with at least 40 ribbons, and maybe more, but most of mine were on the ground. Granted, I put out the wrong type branches for them to use. I imagine I will see pretty low numbers of actual eggs hatched.
My guess is you see a pretty high hatch rate at your place. Mine can only improve.

Average hatch from a ribbon will depend primarily on where the ribbon is located, clarity of the water(silt), and of course size of the ribbon and how well it is fertilized. I've seen some ribbons with very few fertilized eggs. This occurs in populations where there is a skewed sex ratio of male to female that sometimes occurs when only one size of graded stocker perch was purchased.

Average eggs per 8"-10" YP is variable and in the range of 25,000-60,000. Some sources say there will be around 6500 eggs per inch of female perch. If you have kids, you can remove a piece of ribbon with eggs and hatch in inside in a big jar, bucket or aquarium. It helps to keep the eggs aerated. After 4-7 days inside and the ribbon starts breaking apart it is hatching. This will give an idea of the viablity that ribbon.

As a manual management, each spring I remove all the ribbons that I can find. I still have a fair number of small perch each year that likely hatch from fragmented ribbons or ribbons laid in deeper water. I have only a few walleye as predators(no bass) and some perch that do not eat pellets. My management philosophy is to produce lots of trophy size perch which means limited competition. Each year I buy some of the largest fastest growing perch from a producer to replace those harvested. This keeps my pellet eating YP population numerous and lots of large trophy size perch.

Bill,
I'd like to hatch some perch inside, but I think I need to wait till the perch ribbon is fertilized right? Any idea on how long to wait if I found it yesterday?

it gets fertilized as the female lays it.

Generally the smaller ribbon that you hatch the more likely that it will not develop fungus that kills the developing embryos. A 2" section of ribbon will contain plenty of eggs for observation. As eggs develop do a water change every day or two with chlorine free house water (well water) conditioned to the same temperature as the current developing eggs. This helps minimize fungus for novices. If you see any all white eggs in the small ribbon section suck just those out with a turkey baster so the fungus does not spread as fast. Another way to do it is to allow the eggs to remain suspended in the pond for 4-6 days then clip off a small piece of ribbon and bring it inside to watch the final development and hatch of the fry. Remember to gently aerate the water with the eggs.

No ribbons here in SE Michigan, the air temperature hasn't been 50 or over but for a few days. I have only seen 2 ribbons since stocking YP a few years ago and no recruitment. My pond is like DonnoBBD, rocks all the way around (no veg.) and a Christmas tree tied to shore. I have an abundance of minnows and a few walleye. This year I'm keeping my aerator off until I think the perch are done to eliminate the silt part of the equation. I may have too many of one size class or maybe too many WE for the amount of perch.

Loretta you don't really don't need to crank up your aeration until just before the pond would stratify. I don't crank mine up until sometime in May.

Save the electricity!

I guess I won't know if I've had a successful hatch until I see schools of little ones, or start catching smaller ones next year. I've got GSH, and RES that should be spawning also. Could be a lot of little ones in there before too long. I might have to shut off the feeder.
I swear, everything I do with this pond, and I mean "observe" because I don't actually "do" that much, is a first. It sure is fun to watch.
I really do appreciate you guys putting up with all my stupid questions..

This year's YP hatchlings, if well fed, should be 3" in August and 4"-5" by fall-October. I've seen young of year (YOY) 4"YP in August. These fish can easily be caught angling with a small piece of worm (#10or12 hook) or in a fish trap both fished close to shore 2ft-4ft deep providing a respectable number of hatchlings survived to be 1" fingerlings.

The boy caught this huge common shiner today. Biggest shiner I have ever seen in my life. It was all of 8"s. If I have a few of these in the pond I see why we have millions of common shiner minnows.

Cheers Don.

Dono - those abundant common shiners are also eating a lot of YP fry. You would not have lots of common shiners if you did not have a water falls where they spawn successfully in the water current. If you want to reduce shiner recruitment turn off the water falls then you will not have any common shiner reproduction this year. If you don't believe me, try it.

I think your 100% correct on the water fall. We placed river rock under the water fall all the way to the bottom of the pond in that area holding the rubber down. In front of the waterfall about 6 feet from the surface is where Andrew caught this huge specimen.

I am very pleased to see our first year 2012 recruitment in the 8-10" range. I guess I never knew how fast these perch grow. 4"-5" first year 8-10" the second and 10-11" third and seeing 13"+ the fourth year. These may not be great growth numbers but to me this is fantastic.

I have the waterfall hooked to my timer that currently is running 10 hours from 8am-6pm during the day. When the water starts to get over 55-60 degrees I then turn the water fall and aeration at night for 10 hours 8pm to 6 am.

Do you think I could become over abundant in over sized shiners?

Cheers Don.