Pond Boss Forums MANAGING AN EXISTING POND Evaluating and adjusting fish populations Help, I'm in the middle of a fish kill

Did I read that chanel catfish have a shorter life expectancy? I have had a heavy loss in my large catfish and I was thinking of the life expectancy. My reason for stating this is if it is true a person might desire to not have channel catfish. I lost 39 that were very large.

Deaner, I don't personally think any catfish has a short life expectancy. I have caught CC up to 25 pounds. They certainly didn't die young. Of course, a 25 lb CC is a rarity to catch. How big were yours?

They were in the neighborhood of 10 #. I had read recently that channel catfish had a shoprter life , but I must be wrong . I have lost 39 or 40 large ones and I am unable to find a good reason for them dieing.

Deaner did the CC look healthy ?

I think the vast majority of CC die within 8 years. However, there are genetic mutants who live 20 plus and they are the ones who attain the massive sizes of 30 plus pounds....

The cat fish that died looked good and with no markings on the ones I could look at closely. AS I stated I have lost about 40 and they are the biggest ones. In looking at the catfish as they feed these are smaller that are visible at the present.

I lost my last posting so if it shows up please delete. The catfish I lost had no marks on the ones I could check closely. In checking the fish eating they are smaller cats. Now yesterday I removed a large cat and one large bream that were dead. In all the fish I have lost there has been one or two bream and one nice sized bass. I have lots of bass unless something has gotten in the pond and eaten them.

During the time of my fish loss I continued to feed lightly and otherwise there was not any change such as rains. Nothing I could contribute this loss. This did not effect the bass, only loss, one bass as I recall.

Just a little update. There are still a ton of fish in the pond, but they are on the small side. A couple weeks after the fish kill the BG got back to spawning. The reason why I am posting is my son was casting a mini jig today and caught a very niced sized BG. I was worried I lost all the larger fish but this showed some survived. Also we replanted some CC yesterday, I just have to have some catfish in my pond.

A small update.

The pond is doing good, just not many large fish. BG continue to spawn in the shallows and there arefry everywhere. The BG that spawn last year continue to grow and feed heavily at the feeder.

Do to me being very lazy I still haven't tested the water. My hunch was that the water flowing down the orchard rows was the problem so now I only fill through the pipe. I just got done bringing the pond up a couple feet. This time I didn't do it all at once but over three days. All appears well.

FA is going to be an issue until I can afford an aeration system.

My other issue I may have to deal with is the balance between LMB and BG. There is a huge population of BG in the pond and many of them are too big for the surviving 6-8" LMB to eat. Over the next couple years I hope the LMB are able to grow and keep the BG in check. If not the pond is small enough that I should be able to get it in check.

Sounds like time to cull some BG Mt. Oh and not to bring up a sore subject but are you effected by the water rationing at all?

nice update mt, sounds like a BG cook-off is in order. is the pipe water from a well? and do you aerate it before it hits the pond? if not, its probably a good idea to do that.......have it splash into some rocks or something.

Jeff,
It is well water and as far as I know they don't ration that around here. We also still have water rights to the canal that borders our property. The farmers/communities about 45 minutes west of use are having a tough time. There are a lot of farms/jobs that have dried up because of politics over what little water they have.

Died,
Some air gets into the well water when it shoots out of the pump and into the standpipe but I am sure it could use some more. This winter I am going to replace the valve that leads to the pond with a larger one. That would be a good time to add a rip rap water fall of some sort.

Talk to you later guys.