Pond Boss Forums STOCKING A NEW POND Creating the food chain New Pond Stocking info

i recently bought a new house with a 1.60 acre pond lmb/bg. It turned out to be full of every unwanted sepcies of fish known to man so after fightin with it for a year trying to get it balanced i pulled the plug an drained it, now im starting over. The state is supplying the fish in a ratio of 2000 BG/RES in march an 200 LMB in may.
Im looking for a good LMB pond but happy with 4-5 lb bass and big bream. They didnt recommed any forage fish to go along with the BG/RES. Are Any needed or will the BG do for forage fish. im sorta worried about the forage fish taking over in pond, i had 16" shad an 12 shinners in the old pond. It had very little BG/RES in pond with mostly shad/shinners/mudcats/crappie an a few LMB around 4lb but no samll fish of any kind so fishing was poor to say the least. so im looking for some info on if i should stock forage fish an how many. pond in in south alabama

The BG/RES ought to provide plenty of forage. The stocking rate seems a little bit heavy but states usually stock tiny stuff and survival is lessened. I think you should be OK. Just remember to monitor it and cull if needed.

To grow huge bass additional forage species are often suggested. However, it sounds like you will be happy with "average" bass growth so there is really no reason to add shad, etc if you don't want to. I would consider adding a small forage fish like mosquito fish or fathead minnow. They will help your pond get started right and they never become a nuisance.

I am not real comfortable with the stocking numbers and timing. Hopefully someone else will chime in with the rationale behind your states' recommendation.

BTW it helps if you provide at least a general geographic location. Best practices in the north a lot different than those in the south.

Good Luck.

I just recieved my shippement of BG/RES an you were right about the size there all around a 1/2 inch to 3/4 inch. thanks for the info ;].
BTW they also recomended 10-15 grass carp to help keep any weeds under control.

kemp31 :

JayMan makes 2 good points. Hard for us to help with "sound" advice if we don't know your appx. location. Second FHs would be a plus. I assume you are in the south if your state has current 1/2-3/4 in BG/RES for stocking. In addition to the FH I would think about buying about 50 intermediate 3-5 in. BG to add if you are going to stock LMB at the standard 10 to 1 ratio. If you are going to include supp. feeding then I would add 50 more 3-5 in. BG (100 total).

my pond is located in selma,alabama roughly central alabama. i was planning on doing supp feeding right from the start but when i asked the state bioloigst said they seen alot of ponds that started feeding bream before the pond was a year or more old ended up with the bream overpopilating the pond.If i was going to add the FH's how many an when should i stock them? i think im going to go ahead an get 100 3-5 in. BG to give my forage base a boost. sholud i go ahead now an start feeding the 3-5 BG?

The BG are too small to do any feeding at this time. I would start feeding small feed when they get about 1.5 to 2 inches long. Go ahead and feed the 3 to 5 inch BG but understand that they might be pretty well dispersed. The bass are stocked in the same proportion as the forgae. They should be able to help control any BG. Of course, I'm not an Alabama State Biologist.

Regarding grass carp, wait until you need them. I doubt that you have anything to feed them at this time.

Dave, thats why im here to get new info from more that the one source so im all ears for new info ;] .
so do you think i sould stock 3-5 BG like ewest suggested or just wiat for the baby frys to grow?

kemp31 :

Ask around your area (or the state hatchery guy) and see if any one is reporting any spawning. If so then I would add the BG and FH ( 1000 should be enough with 2 sizes of BG). Our water temps are 60 degrees and it is time to stock.

I would use Purina Gamefish Chow because it has several different size pellets so all the fish will have some their size. If not that then you may want to get 2 different types of different size pellets. Ask the hatchery what they are feeding.