Pond Boss Forums STOCKING A NEW POND Types of fish to choose To stock or not to stock channel cats?

Pond is 3/4 acre. Stocked with FHs and 500 BG late Oct of 04, 100 REs and 100 CNBG in Feb 05, and 60 LMB in late May 05. BG and FHs have had sucessful spawns. Some BG are nearly hand size and the 6 bass I have caught in the last few weeks have ranged from 9 to 12 inches. BG are fed 4 or 5 days a week during warm weather.

I would like to have decent fishing for both BG and bass, not at all concerned about trophy bass but I would like to be able to have some nice BG. I am considering stocking a 100 or so cats this spring. I love to eat em and so does my family. I have become the popular family fish fry man. My neighbor has a cat pond and has always encouraged me to take all I want but I hate to continue now that we have our own pond.

Question is this. How will stocking and feeding cats negatively effect the BG feeding? My fear is that the cats will scare the BG away from the feed. Any way to avoid this? I dearly love quality BG, but really like eating cats as well.

Any advice or personal experiences appreciated. Thanks

I see no problem at all stocking 100 cats they will need to be 5-7 inches min. to survive bass predation. No more than 150 catfish MAX. You will simply need to feed enough for both cats and bluegill. Bluegill have small stomachs and can not eat much per feeding mutiple feedings per day is better than one much less 4-5 times per week.

What I'm getting at is that if you just feed with current method bluegill will get little food with the catfish getting the bulk. I think a feeder is in order to achieve your goals of both good bluegill and catfish. We sell Aquapro feeders but other good ones like Sweeeny out there as well. Without one I would stock no more than 50 catfish to have a chance at good bluegill growth.

Coach B:

I've been feeding my CC for two full years; my BG only started taking feed the last half of 2005. In my limited experience, the two species tend to eat in separate areas. The BG can be observed eating near shore where only one or two cats will come and take a mouthful of feed. Almost all of the CC eat in deeper water.

My guess (emphasis on "guess") is that CC you add will probably eat what they want and exclude some of the BG from some of the food. You will obviously need to feed more to fill up both CC and BG than you fed to fill up just BG, if they eat to the same level of satiation/satisfaction. Possibly you could feed enough additional food to make up for this, IF you are not already pushing the envelope wrt water quality. How much/often did you feed last year?

If you were already feeding near the recommended limits or have other reasons to worry about water quality, consider putting in fewer CC in 2006 (maybe 50) to lessen the impact while you study the interaction. I like fishing for CC and my family likes eating them, but I put 100 CC in 1 acre and would not stock quite that many if I had it to do over.

Hopefully someone has much more experience feeding both CC and BG and can give better advice.
P.S. I see Greg already did.