Pond Boss Forums INTRO Questions & Observations Could use some advise on our pond, pics

First off let me say that after reading and searching this site for a week or so, I must say this is a boat load of information. I will be purchasing your mag, I can only imagine the info contained within it's page's. My limited knowledge on pond building will become evident as time goes on. But one can only learn by asking the ones with the knowledge, and that would be you folks !!!

I will try to keep this short.

Bass fishing is what I "claim" to know, structure, cover, when they bite best, stuff like that. A very good friend of mine has some land with a pond on it. A little over a year ago I started fishing it at his request, just to see what was in it. Within a week I had caught and released some LMB up to 5 lbs. He became interested in LMB fishing and soon, many thanks to me, was hooked himself.

In the fall he approched me and asked what was needed to be done to make it better, and to raise some big bass. I threw out some ideas, and was, shall we say, hired to oversee the project. I just wanted to make it deeper and a little larger.

With that said, here's a link to some pics of what has taken place so far. My server is slow so be patient please.

http://www.guestfamily.com/robertg/pond.htm

Question: We moved the fish on Friday, it was a success. 33 fish over 3 lbs. Of that, 12 in the 4 lb range, and 2 pushing 7 lbs. There was much rejoicing. Now they need some food. We moved a bunch of BG's also, but most of the small ones didn't make it. The fish truck comes to town on Friday the 29th. I was going to buy 10 lbs. of FHM. But now I'm wondering if 5 lbs of FHM and 100 1" to 3" CNBG would be better. Those big bass need some food, not a bunch of minnows. This will not be part of my stocking program, just the buffet table if you will. We need adult CNBG to obtain any amount of success.

Will that amount hold them through winter if they have to stay there ? And they probably will. Does anybody have a better idea for these fish ?

Trying to keep it short, many questions to follow, and many thanks for any help.

We have already moved the fish into the new "part" of the exsisting pond. Now phase two will be renovating the exsisting pond, rebuilding the dam, and then flooding it into one big pond, about 3 acres.

When the job is complete then we will stock it with more bass and forage. All we did was saved the big bass, I should say we moved what we could.

For now, I'm just trying to keep them fed and alive until the job is complete.

Bob :

Welcome to the fourm . I think you will find much here to help in your pond adventure.

Please feel free to ask questions. Sometimes it takes a while to get answers but not often.

A couple of things to think about. It takes about 10 lbs. of forage a year to add one pound of weight to a LMB. I think I remember that it takes about 75% of that to maintain their status. It appears you have about 125-130 lbs of LMB. They will be confined for 6-8 mths. Part of summer , fall and winter , a mixed growth period. You can't assume the bass will catch all the forage you put in-- they are good predators but not that good. It would take {use up} to much energy for all of the bass to chase all of the forage. As bass get larger they require larger forage so that they don't run an energy deficit in catching food. A 5 lb. bass will use up more energy than it takes in if it chases 2 in. BG. Any forage fish you put in may well end up in the larger pond. Normal forage options are sunfish { BG, RE, and their relatives} , shiners , fatheads , shad and others. Each has + and - . I assume that you have enough o2 based on your picts. and that it is deep enough to avoid freeze over problems. Others here can address those matters better than me , but you should check on that to be sure. I think you are going to have to add a lot of forage of a large size to meet your goal . This type/size of forage is not always available unless you are going to catch it yourself. You may be able to trade some of the bass for some forage or find someone with a BG stunted pond and net some. Because of the size of the enclosure you should add the forage over time. If you put in that much forage at once in hot weather you may cause a DO crash . I think you can manage to your goal if you can locate the forage and it is within the budget. If the fish do make it then you will need a custom stocking plan but you will be ahead in the long run. I would suggest you get a copy of raising trophy bass from the PondBoss office . It will answer many of your questions. Good luck and keep us posted. ewest

ewest:

Thanks for the reply, you raise many good points, also, many more questions.

I don't even know how to check the o2 level. We just run the areator for 3 to 4 hrs in the morning and evening. Prior to moving the fish it ran 24 hr's for 3 days. Overkill, maybe, but we don't know any better. Because the water is only 5' deep, should it run longer?

We are not deep enough to prevent a fish kill from freeze over, yet. We need 8' of water, and if we get our normal fall rains we will be fine. I know it's a gamble but killing these fish was not an option. We have close to 300 acres of watershed, 3" of rain will fill that section of pond.

In the process of moving the LMB we did move hundreds of the BG's in the 4" to 5" range. I stopped counting the dead ones at 200, but it has slowed down, the dying that is. Fact of the matter is, we have no idea how many are in there. If I understand you right, putting in the CNBG mentioned above would hurt more then it would help.

We did our best to move the food chain, we didn't just move the bass only. But how does a man know if the fish are ok ? All of this should have been figured out first, but I just found this site, I hope it's not to late.

So do I not put any FHM in there come Friday ? Your right about the heat, water temps in the high 80's. I don't want to create a DO crash, that would be the death of me after all this work.

Anybody out there please feel free to chime in, I'm all ears and afraid time is of the essence.

Thanks for the response,
Bob

Bob :

Sorry for the delay. I misunderstood your 1st post. I thought you had no BG saved that they all died. If you have a forage base then many of my prior comments are not applicable. Based on your new post I am concerned about the stress level of your BG and LMB. It is tought on them to move them in the heat and often they die. DO and o2 are the same concept -- how much oxygen is in the water. There are many more qualified people on this site regarding areation than me.We need more input from them. See the post below which is a good example.

http://www.pondboss.com/ubb/ultimatebb.php?ubb=get_topic;f=20;t=001851

http://www.pondboss.com/ubb/ultimatebb.php?ubb=get_topic;f=11;t=000119

You need to have an idea of the number/weight of all the fish in the enclosure and its size and depth to see if it can carry the biomass and what to do to help-- feeding and areation etc. I suggest local professional help from your Game& Fish Dept. or a fisheries professional. With the gravitity of the situation and the need for on site assesment I do not want to guess and give bad info. I hope this helps. Do the fish look under stress ? Are they near the surface and gasping for air , if so you need to take steps now. ewest

Bob,
If you think there might be a DO problem then would think running the aerator all night would give the most benefit without raising water temps. Early morning just before daylight is when DO will be the lowest.
If you could get some spawning size BG in the new pond addition now & maybe not put bass in until late fall you should have lots of forage for the bass.
I would also get the fatheads in so they could spawn. The BG will benefit from the fathead fry.

One other thought .. there doesn't appear to be enough cover in the new pond. All I saw was one tree & a stump. I believe the general rule of thumb is 20% of the pond should contain structure.
Also the fatheads won't last long once the bass are introduced unless you can get some weedbeds going.

Ric:
Thanks for the reply. Here's a link to cover that has been added over the last couple days There's four pics. Will be adding some rock piles to it, but no more brush. Weedbeds and lilly pads will come next spring when she's full.

http://www.guestfamily.com/robertg/cover.htm

I'll be searching the aerator posts for a while to see whats there. I've Been running our areator in the mornings and eve, seems to be fine.

ewest:
I know what a stressed out woman looks like, but a fish, you got me.

All seems fine tonight, no more dead LMB or BG today. No gasping for air or swimmin near the surface, none of that. Dozer operator said they were breaking the surface this morning. Overcast with a front blowin through, I wasn't surprised.

After discussing the moving of these fish with my helper's, we came to the conclussion that there plenty of 3" to 5" BG's in there to last quite a while. Exact count of all fish, not going to happen, it was fast a furious once the water dropped. We just focused on the big LMB for a rough count. We can only estimate, but there' enough for a 1 acre lake easy.

Think I'll just add two pounds of FHM (about 600)on Friday morning and see how it all pans out over the next week or two. Walked around today with a jig and caught 3 8" LMB just crusing the shore line. The well is filling at about 1" a day. Should be full in 2 years.

Bob :

That is good news . If the bass and BG are eating then stress level is not to high. I would watch the early am splashing . If it is feeding that is good if it is fish breaking the surface for air then may be a DO problem. Late night /early am is when some DO problems are at the worst.

Sounds like you have enough forage for now. I would put a couple of pallets in with the fatheads. They may spawn in the pallets and provide some forage down the road. If there is no DO problem and enough forage then no need to figure the #/weight of fish or water vol. Good luck . ewest

ps tomorrow I will review pics. with comments on cover/lake design etc.

If you have an aerator, why not use it 24/7 during this critical time? The electricity used is insignificant compared with the alternative.

Bob :

Good pics. but I have a hard time getting the big pict. of your pond. I will try a few observations. Look at the fourm heading Creating Habitat for ideas. Did not see a pier. If there is one think about what you want close to it. Like fish beds to fish and watch or rock piles or other ambush points near the beds. BG nest sites -- I did not see any flat areas in 2-5 ft. of water. Clay , sand or small rock are good BG nest sites. I saw a big pile of brush in the background not in pond. It looked like hardwoods piled to burn. They would make a good pile/hump in deep water. Might go from +1 to -12 ft. and make deep part of pond productive. May even be big enough to make several. They would make a good place to fish outside of summer or when the fish are deep. Posts or big limbs driven into the bottom where the water is deep so they stand up above the surface make great places to tie xmas trees or brush for years after the pond fills and also mark your brush piles for fishing. Can do the same in shallow water 0-6 ft. Pallets stood upright and posted in pond bottom in a line make a great underwater fence . If put so it runs north to south in 6-8 ft of water the fish can for most of the day pick sun or shade depending if winter or summer. Also a gerat ambush point. Last point -- it is much easier to do this type of work while the lake is empty or down and the equipment is on site. My thoughts for now , probably more than you wanted .Good luck. ewest