Pond Boss Forums MANAGING AN EXISTING POND Evaluating and adjusting fish populations LMB Weight & Size

I am needing some feedback regarding my growth rates of my LMB. Stocked 50 Native and 50 Florida in my 1.5 acre (avg. depth of 8 feet.) pond. The fish were stocked in June 2009 and were lengths of 1.5-2.0". I stocked 750 BG in Sept. 2008. All in all, I'm happy with the pond. I have had no fish kills and have witnessed many spawning BG. My LMB grew alot from June to Sept. 2009, but it seems like they have slowed way down. I am catching fish that average 8" with an ocassional 10" fish. They seem healthy and they eat aggressively, but they don't seem to be growing like I would have expected.

What is the body condition of the larger LMB? Are they fat looking with small heads? Equally porportioned? (head/body)

Length only tells you that there was enough food for them to get to that length. It's the length/weight combination of information that tells the whole tale.

The 8-10" fish look the same to me. They are not mini footballs, they are slender with well perportioned bodies/heads. I do feed daily generic floating fish food, but do not have bass eating (or that I have observed). I have alot of small BG that run the bank and LMB attack those regualarly.

They just seem small for their age to me. Maybe I should get shad started?

Martin you stocked less bluegil than I would have liked to have seen however not too diff than normal recommendations.
For our clients wanting bass growth I would have suggested 3000 bg/res and 75 total bass plus other forage. The bass we stocked under this plan at last June are now 2.5-4 lbs.

So my point is I think you need more bluegill as well as you might want to pull a few of the bass out of the pond to free up competetion. Stocking shad is a bonus but sometimes tough to establish on that small a pond. GL

This is how a 20 mth old LMB in normal/good condition should look. If it looks less well conditioned than that you need more forage and or less LMB or both.

http://www.pondboss.com/forums/ubbthreads.php?ubb=showgallery&Number=225512#comments
or this one Eric

Greg that is not normal condition. That is the football type.

ewest: I might have been seeing and catching this spring's spawn. My son said that he caught a better fish this last week. Your post showed a 20 month fish, mine were stocked early June 2009. So lets say they are 15 months old, what size fish should I be catching (length & size)?

Just a little smaller than the one in the pic above.

Martin if you want to have a large catchable school of bass listen to Greg and Eric. I have been trying to follow their advice and am removing more predator fish such as catfish and any bass that dont look to be footballs. I am also feeding and stocking more bluegill and to a lesser extent redears. constantly weighing and measuring your fish against a fish chart will give you at least a pretty good idea of how they are doing.