Pond Boss Forums INTRO Questions & Observations Question about BG/RES spawning

Question #1
I stocked 200 OTSCNBG and 100 Res. The BG were 1-3" and the RES were 2"4". Will those 2 cross?


Question #2
I'm thinking yes, they might. However from what I can gather, the RES only spawn once a year. Is that correct? The BG will spawn 4-5 times. So in theory, I should have many more True bred BG than hybrid. Correct?


Question #3
When harvest time comes, I should harvest the offspring. Correct?

Question #4
Will the hybrid be easy to tell apart from the true BG?


I'm probably way overthinking this, but it was something that popped in my head this afternoon.

Personally, I would hope for some hybridization. You should still have plenty of pure BG, and any hybrids that occur will make you wish for more.

I wouldn't worry about it. Only about 1 to 2 % of the eggs ever laid will survive to be spawning fish.

I feel the same way. And since most of the hybrids will be male, not as much worry about BG over population and stunting.

From what I read natural hybridization is much more common only in certain circumstances. One instance is turbid water where there could be some confusion between species. Another is if there are very few of one of the species so the potential for mates is very limited.

In my sediment pond I had only a very few GSF. So I had lots of natural hybrids likely because it was hard for the female GSF to find a GSF mate so chose second best, a RES or BG.

If there are plenty of RES and BG in the pond, I would guess hybridization would be minimal if any.

I've got a 1 acre pond initially stocked with 750 BG and 250 RES over 10 years ago and I've never seen a hybrid... Doesn't mean there isn't any, though???

I just caught my first hybd bg or hybd res (same/same). No doubt about it. it was not a cnbg and not an res, but looked similar to res with no red ears. My original stocking in the 3.5 acres was 3200 cnbg and 1850 res. I am pretty sure that was the number without looking up the paper work, Dam CRS

Thanks guys. I figured I was worried about nothing.


Tracy,
Compared to my few fish, you have a bunch!

I understocked mine I guess. I had estimated it to be 1/2 acre, but I know it's a little bigger. I've been thinking all this week about getting more CNBG, but wondering if I should wait and see how these go. I was scared to put too many because I was afraid they might not survive, but they seem to be doing great.


Do you think another 200 or 300 CNBG would help or do I have enough?

I would think it depends on what your goals are? And nothing wrong with starting out with your numbers, they will reproduce soon and many more will show up in the pond.

One line of thinking is you will actually get higher total numbers of reproduction in the end by stocking fewer fish. Sounds counterintuitive, but here is the logic.

Larger BG eat tiny BG larval fish and fry. If you start out with fewer numbers of stocking fish there likely will be very high survival rates of early spawns. With larger initial stocking you get more larger fish early on, but they are predators of the larval fish. So if you only stocked a few pair of stockers, you might have 95% survival rate of fry. But if you stock large numbers of stockers, you get lots of predation of fry so might have 95% eaten. I am totally guessing at the percentages, they are probably way off. But that is theory.

So with light stocking, you will get fewer larger fish early on but greater numbers of surviving fry. More small fish.

That makes sense Snrub, Thanks!

I would not worry about any possible RE BG hybrids. BG males protect their offspring so the biggest ones fry do not get much predation from other BG.