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

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.