Pond Boss Forums STOCKING A NEW POND Creating the food chain Bullhead for forage?

I have been reading around the site for a few months and most people seem to hate bullheads. I fish for them once in a while and they are OK, and they taste pretty good. So, I was wondering if they would make good forage for LMB. They have a fusiform shape. They don't have all the stiff fins, just the one spine on the back and the two pectoral spines. Would they be good additions to ponds for big LMB? Or would they cause more problems than they are worth?

Will bass eat them? Absolutely, are they a good forage for bass compared to BG in most circumstances... No. I myself like bullheads over CC for eating. The problem is many ponds struggle to produce good eating size bullheads because of stunting. You generally need large numbers of smaller bass to keep their numbers low so the ones that are left grow to good eating size.

When I had bass in my pond for a dozen years I had large Israeli carp and KOI for algae control. In all those years I never saw any new KOI or Israeli carp added to my original populations. So my Algae (FA) was being converted to carp fry that made fat predictors. That was a win win for me. If my clear pond concept I am trying now doesn't work out I will go back to that system if I can find the Israeli carp.

Jason -- I have seen them overtake too many small lakes and ponds to ever recommend them. It doesn't take too many seasons for them to become stunted to the point where they aren't worth catching. I've seen it happen in impounds with northern pike, and/or largemouth bass.

Thanks, I won't use them then.