Pond Boss Forums MANAGING AN EXISTING POND Feeding Maintaining a exsisting pond

Hello everyone, I have recently gotten back into fishing after a few years of moving/working etc. I have a private pond that I have started fishing but after 4 or 5 times of fishing it seems that the pond could be overpopulated. All I catch is 10 to 14 inch bass. The owner of this pond doesn't even fish it and from the looks of it no one else does either. Pond is really clear, very clean bottom. From talking to the owner he is pretty much game for me to do whatever to the pond, he has 2 fish feeders that aren't running that I plan on getting up and running. My goal is to have some of the bass to grow. I have a son that is 2 and he loves going to the pond so I would like to get in good shape since I will be taking him a lot of the time. My question is should I start taking the 14 inch and under out, or add more forage or both. Also I have only been about 5 times to the pond so there could be some lunkers that I haven't seen. I live in south Alabama we have been having hot/cold weather which could be throwing them off. I have yet to see any Bluegill and with the amount of small bass I'm catching I am wondering if they have enough food. Any help would be appreciated. (BTW pond is 1-2 acres)

Welcome to PBF!

Sounds like a fun project. Please tell us more about the pond. How big is it and how deep? What is there for habitat/cover/structure (vegetation, rock piles, brush piles, etc.)? You will need good habitat/cover for small BG to hide in if you want to try to get a BG population established with all those bass. I would do some sampling with just a simple small piece of worm under a bobber. That could be enlightening as to what other species besides bass are present. Hopefully, one of the pros will be along to offer some sage advice.

Again, welcome!

Bill D.

Thanks for the welcome!! So far I have fished only from the bank. To be honest there doesn't seem to be a ton of structure at least from what I can see. If I had to guess the deepest part is somewhere between 15 and 20 ft, possibly a little deeper. There is a huge dock that does extend out on the water with plenty of beams under it for a little structure but other than that not much visible on top. I am headed out there again in the morning and I am going to print off a relative length/weight chart and start documenting these fish some. Yea I might need to try and see if I can catch some bluegill, I haven't seen any but maybe there is more than enough there.

Welcome to the forum bulletbone.

Lots of good information here.

I'm not an expert and most of my knowledge comes from what I have read on here. So don't take this as a recommendation till you actually hear from someone who knows what they are doing. Plus probably quite a bit more information would be helpful. Some pictures or description of any cover you might have for forage fish. Size of pond?

But if you have a LMB crowded pond with little structure or cover, adding forage before you thin the bass out and provide some hiding places for the forage might just be expensive bass snacks as the overpopulated bass quickly wipe out any small fish you introduce as forage.

You likely will need to reduce bass numbers, provide more cover for small forage fish to get to be bigger forage fish, and maybe introduce some adult BG to increase forage production.

But those are all just ideas, not a recommendation. Just something to think about.

Yea I have fished it a few more times and I am almost 100% sure it is overpopulated. Guy said I could do whatever to the pond. So my plan is to first start taking the small ones out. Next is to get his feeders up and running, also might dump some Christmas trees in there for cover for the forage. I am hoping this will give me a good start on getting that pond some lunkers!