jb - I agree, you will get more long term value/benefit from your money if you spend it on buying larger bgill and a fish food feeding program. If you had different pond conditions shiners would be more worth a try.
I'm still not completely sold on gizzard shad. I think you need really big bass to thin the larger individuals. Or have a way to manually or periodically thin large adults. A lot of a pond's fish productivity gets tied up in shad biomass instead of more "beneficial" panfish. Depending on how one defines beneficial. I think the concept of using g.shad to produce trophy LMB is valid but I don't think most pond owners can adequately manage a gizzard shad population. Bob Lusk and other g.shad aficionados should get together and write an article in PBoss magazine on how to manage g.shad populations in ponds. Hear that Mark McD???
If B.Lusk reads this, has he or others ever experienced alewives (alewife) as forage in ponds? It is an exotic and an invader from the Atlantic. The landlocked form is a planktivour and only reaches 3"-6" long similar to the threadfin shad. It tolerates northern winters, but is intolerant of sudden temperature changes then massive die offs can occur. Thus it has a bad reputation in the Great Lakes. Anyone with pond experience with this one?? If I get no response from this I may move it to its own topic. Any way to move this paragraph rather than completely retyping it?
