Pond Boss Forums INTRO Questions & Observations LMB eating catfish food?

Over the past few weeks I have noticed that my LMB have been eating fish food. I know that this is not suppose to happen so I figured that it was an isolated incident. What has happened is that each time I go to feed more and more of them have been showing up, to the point of literally twenty or thirty of them eating with the bluegill. Is this something that is an anomaly in my pond only or is this common place. By the way the fish that I am seeing are fat and all differnt sizes.

If anyone else has had this happen, I like to hear from you.

We have 3 feeders and have some bass feeding on every one of them. I would guess more like 3-4 bass on each one and not every time. I think some of them just figure it out and boy is it fun to watch them.

If you bass were originally purchased from a hatchery they are probably feed trained. Otherwise some may learn by association. However, it's doubtful that many would learn by association. One thing to keep in mind. If that is the only thing they get they are not getting the proper nutrition. They need higher protein, higher fat, and less carbohydrates than catfish. You may want to consider using a higher quality food for both the bass, bluegill, and catfish. The bluegill an bass will benefit from it and it won't hurt the catfish.

I have a one acre pond in ohio and my lmb started eating my fish food also. I don't know weather I didn't have enough forage fish in the pond but they were eating the pellets. I just don't want them to get too used to the pellets as they might not be catchable.

Don't worry about them not being catchable if they feed on pellets. I feed quite a few bass in my pond pellets and they are just as catchable on artifical lures as any other bass. I just took out ten 2 to 3 pound bass for a taxidermy school off the pier with a jig. My bass still eat forage fish when they get a chance and due to that my pond has very few bluegills.

It must be hell to be a bluegill in my pond with all the bass. I will be feeding about 400 bass this summer.