Pond Boss Forums STOCKING A NEW POND Types of fish to choose What to do?

I have a 30 acre (+/-) natural body of water. It is a water source for a summer pasture for beef cows. The cows pay my bills and are not going anywhere. There are quite a few minnows and an over abundance of leaches in what i am going to refer to as "the lake" from now on. I am a beef rancher, who loves to fish but simply do not have enough time to go out fishing for the day very often. I have considered stocking the lake many years and i think it may very well be worth it. However i know nothing of managing for fish. I do love to eat certain fish; walleye, yellow perch and black crappie are my 3 favorite to eat.
So, here we go. 30 acre lake in northern ND, very similar conditions as seen in northern MN. Depth is not absolute but a very good guess would say at 15ft or slightly deeper at the deepest. Lots of aquatic vegetation of all kinds with a silty/clay bottom. Mostly surrounded by oak and aspen trees, few large rocks no rock beds. No stream, river or creek in or out and to my knowledge no spring either. I would like to have at least one of my favorite fish in there and no large mouth please. I would restock but prefer not to restock every species. Also i do not foresee these fish being fed, I am interested in catching eating size fish but don't care about catching a "trophy". So a self sustaining population would be best. As stated earlier there are minnows and leaches in the lake but i do not know what kind of minnow they are. I do not believe there have ever been any game fish in there. I will be happy to provide any more information that i can at your request. So cuss and discuss the subject and lets see where it goes.

I know you made a ton of people very envious with your first nine words ever posted on this forum.......

"I have a 30 acre (+/-) natural body of water."

Sounds like you could have a lot of fun with a body of water that big. Looking forward to seeing what the experts recommend.

Anybody gonna help JPs out?

First welcome to the site!! Great place to be. As HalfAcre said, I'm one of those envious folks with your (30+/-) comment. LOL I appreciate the beef cattle comment. I was an ag teacher (FFA) for about 10 years...its what my degree is in. Cattle are not ideal to have around a pond...mainly because of manure and the nutrients they add..but there are probably thousands of ponds/lakes with cattle and great fishing. We have cattle and horses on ours.

I'm by NO means one of the experts, they'll chime in soon I figure. From all my reading here I would expect you to be asked about water quality. That will be a big factor for stocking, as you don't want to spend alot of money just to have them die because of water quality issues. Texas A&M does the testing as do many other places. I mention A&M because I used them. Most of the time its around 20 or 30 dollars to have it tested. You put it in a clean water bottle and send it in with a check. They email and send you a hard copy of the report. I can get you more information on that if you would like...send you a link and such.

I think also you'll be asked about the true population of the lake. 30 acres is a large area...(shaking head in envy)...I think what your after is doable, but like in my case, I did not know what was in my pond. Well turned out to be a lot of Green Sunfish...so when I stocked all my little Bluegill...needless to say, few survived. And still few survive because the little get eaten. If I would have known prior to stocking I could have prevented that. You could seine it or have it done, have someone shock it, or the like. Do this in a small area to get a sampling of what you have. I think you are kind of looking for an average population. Mainly to make sure what you have will not eat all your little stockers as soon as they are placed in the lake. Take pictures and post and the folks here can help you id them and tell you if your stocking will work...or if you need to go another route. If its full of minnows, and you do not know what they are...I wonder if its possible they could be a bunch of stunted fish...some kind of sunfish...that because of population numbers and lack of food are severely stunted and in over abundance. That would happen because of no predator species...like the bass, crappie, walleye, etc.

My thoughts would be gather as much information about your body of water as you can...pictures...water survey...etc. Take your time.
Get the opinions of the experts here, then go from there. Know as much about your body of water as you can. No you can't always do it perfect...but at least you'll know and will not be throwing money away because you didn't have as much information as you can. I did that...not fun. Then you have to try to do a reboot, which isn't fun either.

Anyways, great to have you and I'm sure we would ALL love to see some pics. What kind of cattle/operation do you have?

I will put some pics up in the next few days... We raise a black angus/hereford cross. We take a black cow, breed her to a hereford. That baby will then be bred to a black bull. The result of that breeding will again be bred to a black bull. We are generally back to a black calf by then, so a hereford bull is used again, and the cycle starts all over. We focus on low to moderate birth weight with a high weaning weight and a low to moderate yearling weight. We like to say that we raise cows and the steer calves are a byproduct that pays the bills. Our cows are a small to moderate sized animal. A full grown cow in our herd weighs between 1200 and 1300 pounds. With focus on width down the back. A long or tall cow is normaly a cull for us. Weaning weights for steers are 630lbs and 560lbs. Heifers weigh between 500lbs and 550lbs. We sell steers the 3rd week of october and the heifers are sold the 2nd week of january.

How's the water conditions up there? As a duck hunter I watch the "prairie pothole" report as that's were most of the ducks that come through here are hatched.

I assume this is an ancient pothole created by the last ice age? I have no idea on best species but I think I would get ahold of a ND fisheries biologist to pick his brain. I suspect they would be glad to help on a 30 acre lake!

My FIL raised angus/hereford cross at one time (black whiteface calves?) but he and my son are mostly all angus now.