Hello all,
It is very nice to be part of this Fantastic forum I stumbled upon over a year ago. I finally decided to sign up and post something . I have read and learned a ton of stuff here, it is amazing what and how much many of you know here. I also am a subscriber and love every issue! I have recommended it (magazine/website) to people almost anytime I have spoken about ponds/lakes and fishing. Thanks for all of it to all of you here!

Now that I have warmed you guys up a bit onto my post LOL .
I have a beautiful 1 acre pond about 16’ deep in the centre with sloped sides and a shallow weedy area at one end with cattails on 2 sides also, it was dug I would say maybe 40 – 50 years ago (when the local road was built).
I had stocked about 190 4”-6” Rainbow Trout this past spring along with a gallon of Northern Redbelly Dace (very nice looking minnows) and a couple gallons of Emerald Shiners. Also I had brought in about 100 (wild) Yellow Perch 2”–4” size. Through the past summer I had been trapping and adding minnows from a local creek (difficult to locate live minnows in large quantities for stocking here, if found can be expensive). I have identified them as: Creek Chubs, Common Shiners (similar to Golden Shiners I think), Blacknose Dace, and a few Fatheads & Suckers. Some (about 15, and will add more) Crayfish were trapped and put in as well as a couple of Brook Trout too. I caught and stocked many frogs young & adult and even some large snails. The pond has many Sticklebacks in it and tons of aquatic bugs/invertebrates in and on the water.
Now my plan, is to have a very diverse easy to catch fishing pond with a few “nice sized” ones for each type of fish. I have a newly born son (November 16, he loves our goldfish and already gets excited looking at them) that will help me with the pond and balance the fish population . I would like to have many types of minnows, crayfish, frogs and such, as well as some Rainbow Trout and Yellow Perch (already in, may add some more feed trained perch from a local pond I know of). This year I want to hopefully add Bluegill, Pumpkinseeds, Black Crappie (I know they can be a bad idea but I think I really want them), and the main predator is going to be Small Mouth Bass caught in whatever size I want (fry/fingerling to master size) from a local lake nearby. I know it may be a bad idea to mix but I think I may want to add some Large Mouth Bass in also (you guys sound like you have so much fun with them, plus I may need some to help the SMB keep the rest of the fish from overpopulating and stunting. Also I was thinking of adding a few Rock Bass at a later date but they may be a bad idea but then again I don’t know much about them either.

My stocking #’s are probably high but here they are anyways maybe some of you guys could help fine tune them and give opinions on all of my ideas.

Rainbow trout - I will not add anymore till I remove some.
Yellow Perch - I may add another 100 – 150 more feed trained 6” – 9” to the 100+ I have in already.
Bluegill - 200 – 300 1” – 4” fingerlings.
Pumpkinseeds - 100 – 200 fingerlings.
Black Crappie - maximum of 50.
Small Mouth Bass - 100 fingerlings probably next year or some this year some next year.
Large Mouth Bass - approx. 50 I would think no more?

At some point I want to try and get some Golden Shiners and some Mudminnows in if I can find some.
Now I have one other question does anyone of you know where I can get the Bluegill in particular (really want some of them ). I have a name of a company in southern Ontario that supplies Large Mouth Bass, Crappie, Walleye, Trout, and he says he should be able to get me Bluegill also. The one problem is it’s a day and a half drive away and they are (I think) fairly expensive ($2.50/ 2”-4”fingerlings) compared to the prices you guys have down south. Are there any other fish stocking farms (or someone with a pond full of fish they want to get rid of :)) in Ontario (preferably western Ontario) that anyone here know of I would greatly appreciate it. I still have to find some Pumpkinseeds from somewhere I would really love some of them.
Anyways, I gotta go enough dreaming for now as my wife would say.
Looking forward to any info you guys can share with me.
Thanks
Y ;\)