Pond Boss Forums INTRO Questions & Observations small bass

I have a 6 acre lake that is 4 years old stocked with bream,bass and a few catfish.I fert. and feed the bream and attempt to manage the pond for bass.I have never been able to get the timeing right on when my bass spawn.i went out today and we caught several bass about 3-4 inches long and the female bass do not appear to have eggs in them.could my bass allready spawned and if so how old would a 3-4 bass normally be?This will be the 3rd year in a roll that i think we missed the spawn.Is it possible they are spawning in early to late december.My pond is located in baton rouge,louisiana.Thanks,Steve

Steve M. :

Welcome to the PB forum. Can you provide when and what you stocked ? Time and size of fish and type. It would be unusual to have 3-4in LMB at this time of year under normal circumstances. It could be the result of a fall spawn which is unusual but can happen. If you have 3-4in. LMB they are not the original LMB you stocked (unless you just stocked them) so you must have had a spawn for them to show up. Growth rates vary but as a general matter a LMB spawned in March in the south will be 3in. by mid summer and 6in. by fall. They don't grow much during the winter but usually are about 8in. by their first birthday. These are averages and any pond can have a faster or slower growth rate depending on its productivity. New pond growth rates can be faster than normal.

It could be that last years YOY LMB were very numerous and growth rates were slow due to over crowding of the 2005 year class. Do you have heavy aquatic weed growth in your pond? I have seen this in our pond before where we have 3-5" LMB right after ice out. Also, 3-4" LMB are probably not old enough to be sexually mature and likely wont produce eggs just yet.

Not syaing this is the case but folks undersize the small fish and oversize big ones. How the heck did you catch 3 inch bass? The mouth is so small at that time. I have sold 8 inch bass and folks claimed they were not more than 5 inches. We measured and most were close to 9 inches. If more like 5-6 inches probably slow growers from last years spawn and this could be due to many diff reasons.