Pond Boss Forums MANAGING AN EXISTING POND Evaluating and adjusting fish populations Right amounts of fish?

My pond is a 13 months old about 9' at deepest and a little over 1/4 acre. My fish guy who has been in business about 20 years came in spring and stocked 20 lbs of FHM. All my reading says 5 lbs or a little more would have been adequate for that size pond. He also stocked 50 LMB last month about 3 inches. Again for that size pond I read 25 or so would be adequate.

He is supposed to come back in Fall and stock HBG. Do you think I should question the quantities he put in, although its to late now. Don't want to accuse someone of trying to make more money, if he has been stocking fish for so long but am I just getting paranoid? What do you guys think?

I think you need a new fish guy. Not sure why he would stock bass before establishing the bluegills as their food source. Those fat heads will be gone by spring.

I think you should not rely on a fish seller for advice. The fatheads will always be to small to feed the bass. 20 lbs of fatheads and 50 lmb of any size is way too many for 1/4 acre.

Make sure your HBG are big enough to not bee eaten by your bass and cross your fingers it all comes out in the end. It seems that a typical small BOW stocking for a LMB/HBG/BG pond either puts the BG and LMB in at the same time IF the goal is a BG pond. OR, the BG/HBG go in first and the bass go in later IF the goal is a good bass pond. Either way, your plan is a bit backwards compared to most I read about here. Certainly all is not lost, just make sure you BG are close in size to our bass. I have read tate a LMB can/will eat fish 2/3rd's their own length. This way it closely mocks a small BOW bass pond stocking method. If your HBG can be much larger than the already stocked LMB, then you start approaching the BG pond goals. remember that your bass have grown this year eating on those FHM's and will likely no longer be 3" long.

What are your goals for the pond?