I dont agree with you. here in Atlanta I use grass carp often. I see your point about scaring a bass or two but I have never seen fishing get bad because of grass carp.

Over the long run grass carp are far more cost effective than using herbicides in a pond or lake provided you stock the fish to control submersed weeds. Many people around here will not allow the use of herbicides in their pond and will gladly stock carp instead of using chemicals.

I agree that grass carp will clean a lake of vegetation. I disagree that vegetation is necessary for sucessful bass and bluegill reproduction. I keep most of the lakes I manage free of aquatic vegetation and the bass and bluegill reproduce just fine. Weeds take nutrients away from plankton thus reducing the primary productivity. Any reduction in productivity will reduce the fish population.

I dont know much about mid west ponds but here in Georgia 10% weed coverage will turn into 90% in a hurry.

A few years ago I was called out to a pond for weed control. the pond was 6 acres in an industrial park. The owners of the park used the pond for irrigation of the common areas. I'm still not sure what the weed was that was growing over the pond, I thought it was slender spike rush, one DNR biologist I took it to identifyed it as needle rush. Nevertheless, it grew all over the pond bottom and floated up in large mats covering the pond (almost 100% coverage). It was being sucked into the intake of the irrigation system and destroying the pump. There are no herbicides on the market that would kill that plant. endothal did not work, diquat did not work, most of the vegetation was submerged thus glyphosate was not even tried. The pond had too much water flow for floridone to work. The only option was grass carp. I stocked them at 30 fish per acre and within 6 months the weeds were under control, the irrigation system has not broken since and I have a happy client.

Also the same pond was void of bass. It was obvious because you could almost walk across the pond on three inch bluegill and tadpoles. I stocked some adult Fla. bass and the guys who work out there are catching some nice fish. The bass are reproducing just fine and growing nicely.

does anyone have info on partial poisoning of grass carp? I have noticed that grass carp seem to come up much faster than game fish in the ponds that I have applied rotenone.

Shan