Hey JoeG -
1. Both of us had no real plan when we stocked our fish. We had no concept of biomass and pond limitations. I sure wish I had access to this forum back then.
2. We both had a mix of species. BG,YP,LMB,BC,CC along with forage minnows such as fatheads and mud minnows.
2. The winter kill I did to my pond was aeration related and had nothing to do with a MN winter. For 6 years the WE were doing just fine in my pond with the exception of no spawning.
3. The WE's in Chucks pond are still growing. We approximate his WE population at about 40 fish give or take. And to my knowledge Chuck has never seen a dead WE other than the ones he put on the cutting board.
4. The WE offspring are now past 18" as observed with underwater cameras and fishing.
5. We stocked 15-17 walleyes with the biggest at 24" (way too many, IMO) and never lost a one during transport or after stocking.
Note: One of our later goals was to raise big perch especially after seeing what Mr. Cecil Baird had accomplished. The problem with those big walleyes is they eat everything especially perch. For our goals the WE just don't provide the return on management investment.
The funny thing about the WE's in our ponds was everyone and I mean everyone we talked to said they would never make thru the first winter. Keep in mind the deepest spot in both ponds is about 6'. After the first winter we caught some in both ponds and continued to catch and see them on the cameras. Today when somebody asks us how the WE's did we tell them you were right none of them made it.
