Been busy with work and culling a 20 acre borrow pit I've been contracted to manage.
I have been keeping track of total pounds of sub 14 inch bass that I've culled. I am also culling all those that are sub 17 inches with a RW score in the 70s or less now as well.
The average RW of the 13 bass I culled and or caught today was 66%. The high was 78% and low was 58% (yeah I know, I double checked this as well).
Two days ago I did catch a 18.75-19 inch 3 lb 6 oz bass which scored 89-95% which I'm pleased that bass in this class are scoring much higher than their 17 inch and under counter parts... This fish was obviously released.
I personally have caught a 4 lb 5 oz approximately 21 inch bass and a 5 lb 3 oz bass approximately 23 inch bass this year. These were caught prior to purchasing a bump board unfortunately...
Total LMB biomass removed to date is 111.5 pounds.
I know 10 lbs/acre is considered the minimum to maintain things, 20 lbs/acre to see improvement, and in some extreme cases 30-40/lbs an acre is needed.
Fortunately I work close to this lake/borrow pit it's max depth is 44 feet and yes I've confirmed it. Water is both gin clear and able to support plenty of vegetation both deep and shallow.
It also produced an 8 lb 7 ounce pre-spawn specimen for my lake managing partner this may, and produced an 8 lb+ specimen back in the early 80s that lived in a tackle shops aquarium. So history is on it's side which is important to trophy fisherman on the west coast anyway.
If time permits I'm planning to remove at the very least 25lb/acre and am considering removing up to 40lb/acre.
I know it's a long shot but do any of you have experience with either cull rates where the RW started in the 60s on average on a BOW this size?
Does more than 35lbs an acre seem excessive? I doubt I could get to that with my two man culling crew as is. Shocking to cull or survey is not an option here for liability reasons...
The goal is obviously to produce some greater than 9 pound bass (pre-spawn) which is freakish for this part of SE Iowa but not cull so many that it hurts the fun family fishing aspect of it.
A nearby public BOW produced a 3 lb 2 ounce 17.25 inch specimen for me today so I figure this 108% RW should be reachable here at a bare minimum.
As you might imagine the BG are both big, and in this water some are shockingly beautiful. Well compared to most places around here... I attached a picture of one that attacked a jackall pompadour.
I'm keeping very detailed records now that I have a bump board and would be happy to share those with the forum in another thread or anyone who has interest.
Thanks to all forum members and I will be subscribing to the magazine very shortly to help contribute at least a little bit.
