Jeff K. and I have a question for the Forum members. Has anyone had success with "wild" yellow perch in your pond picking up on a new feeding program? Maybe they trained by themselves, or maybe they learned from some other species in the pond? We'd like to hear all stories, both successes and not-so-successes! Thanks.

This might not mean much, as I had a sample size of 2, but I will say it anyways bacause I thought it was interesting...When I lived in South Dakota I had a couple 4-5 inch "wild" yellow perch in my 40 gallon fish tank along with some bluegill. The only thing i would put in the tank was fish food pellets I had bought at Wal-Mart. The BLG took too the food...probably within a day, and had been in the tank for a good 6 months before the perch were introduced. It took the perch a couple weeks to get hungry enough, but they started to activily feed at the top of the tank just like the BLG, however, they were never really all that aggressive when feeding, nor did they eat much...but they still did it...

Dave,

I read a study on the Internet a while back where they took wild yellow perch and were able to get them on feed, after I believe it was, 8 days of starving them in a tank. Unfortunately I don' remember which one it was and where it is. All I remember is it was one of the state DNRs.

That said, as of today I am going to concentrate the yellow perch in my production pond in the last 10 feet or so of the pond with a seine. I'm not convinced I have as many this year that have taken to the feed, and albeit late in the year, I'm hoping I can get more of them on the feed. If anything I can at least get an idea of what is in the pond as I just don't believe I have the numbers I had last year.

Although I was excited to see significantly larger fish feeding on night in deeper water under the light one night, I'm seeing mostly under size perch higher in the water column under the light. I'm not convinced those fish are feeding on the feed, but rather going after zooplankton. They are also feeding on surface insects quite aggressively. They are not much bigger than the average bait minnow in length and relative weight, but they should be larger.

If you're interested I can take pics and keep you posted on progress. I would have done this sooner but was dealing with macrophyte issues and tennis elbow. Now I've pretty much recovered from the tennis elbow and have raked all the macrophytes out of the pond. I dropped the pond about a foot last night to make sure the seine had plenty of extra depth to be most effective.

Thanks, guys. Almost missed this thread. Yes, Cecil, I think it would be great for you to post updates.

I'm currently trying to pellet feed a resident population of yellow perch in the quarry. I've caught a couple of perch, but still haven't seen any come up to the pellets. I'll keep you guys informed.

Bruce - maybe try buying some larger pellet trained YP that are too big for most of your predators. Sometimes the other perch that hang with the pellet feeders will learn to take some feed from example. Using softened (hydrated) pellets helps a lot to get new perch to initially accept pellets. I plan on preparing a PB article how I train larger YP and others for a spring issue.

I havent seen it yet. In many fed ponds, even the feed trained perch from a hatchery dont stick to feed year round. They just show up occasionally through the year to eat.

I have observed bluegill and perch eating fish food poop from trout and hybrid striped bass who do their duty while feeding on surface pellets.

I think part of the problem is YP can be wanderers and if possible will stray far from the feeding areas. It is known that fish will travel only limited distances to feeding spots. With ample natural foods in remote areas, pellet fed fish can forage well, or at least survive, and not need pellets. Thus the amount of natural foods and size of water body are important factors. Another concern is how long the pellet trained YP were habituated; the longer, the more likely they will stay eating pellets. Two to four months of pellet training does not instill a strong pellet feeding response in YP, especially older newly trained YP.

YP are not surface feeders and often not open water feeders, but primarinly near bottom and bottom feeders. Thus it is unnatural and not instinctive for them to rise to the surface for a food item. Extended habituation to surface feeding is very important to keep YP eating surface pellets.

A third concern is what is the domesticated history of the parentage of the new YP. A long history favors staying on pellets. For my pellet trained YP I prefer to have them eating pellets 12 to 24 months before release into the open pond.

Here's my blocking net in place with the belt feeder looking to the south end of the pond. I should have done this two months ago!



Here's a longer view of the entire perch production pond looking north. Notice I dropped the water level a little to make sure there was plenty of slack for the seine.



Edit: When I went out to feed this evening I noticed a large painted turtle on the inside of the net. I'm hoping he won't try and chew his way out. If so everything I'm trying to do is in vain. I'm going to try and remove him ASAP tonight with whatever means necessary.

Bill,

You da man when it comes to advice on yellow perch!

Cecil,
That looks like a very good idea. I thnk you are correct you should have done this a month or more ago. Learn by doing.

Actually I really wanted to but I had such a painful case of tennis elbow there was no way up until now I could rake the weeds out of the pond before positioning the net. Next year 3.2 oz. of Whitecap per 1/10th acre pond and I shouldn't have to deal with the pondweed!

Any idea how long the net can handle being in the water Bill?

Net will probably first clog with an overgrowth of FA and probably start to sink. That will probably determine how long it stays in the water. If that does not happen, then 2 months should be no problem for a nylon net. Got a power washer? You will probably need one to clean the net when done pellet training.

Yes I have a power washer.

Bill, I never thought about the power washer. That's a good idea. I'll use it on the cages when I pull them out the end of the month. The BG look like they are big enough to survive on their own.

So you really didn't read my article on cages did you?

Article, what article??