Pond Boss Forums STOCKING A NEW POND Types of fish to choose New Pond

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A brief note about Your stocking plan. AS I look at it I see only one good forage fish and you are expecing it to feed LMB, HSB, Catfish and chain pickeeral. A lot of the catfish will eat food from the feeder, but I am not sure two feeders will be enough to adequately feed all the catfish that you or someone tells you to stock. I think a good portion of the 18+" catfish will be eating fish.

If you search in detail here about HBG and RES you will find that they will not produce bunches of small forage sized fish. Some of the HBG will also eat all types of small 3/4"-1.2" fish when they are available. So I foresee You having a lot of hogs over eating the small bgills that are produced each spring early summer. I think you will find that the select few fish that are feeding at the feeders will be growing quite well whereas most of the others will overall have pretty slow growth due to the shortages of forage fish. All the current supply of rosey reds and Gambusia will pretty much disappear in 12 to 24 months. I know it seem almost impossible, but it does occur frequently. All the predatory fish including lots of the HSB will have gotten a jump start on growth from consuming Gambusia and rosey fatheads, and then the bottom falls out of the forage fish base. I am sure bgill alone will not be able to keep up the forage supply for the total predatory community.

Basically you have too many predatory fish compard to the numbers of species that are good forage fish producers. Some pondowners would also want to put crappies in the pond too, which would even more reduce the numbers of small forage fish. I am kind of suprized you did not list crappie also.

One thing your stocking combination will do is severly restrict the numbers of bluegills. The ones that are able to feed at the feeders will get big IF they are not crowded out by the hoggish catfish. You will see what I mean once a bunch of the catfish get 16+" long.

I can't think of much good advice right now for you, if you are firm on the types of fish you want to stock. Others may be able to think of some good ways for this to work for you.