Salex, the reason those carp barely made a dent is you stocked at too low of rate. With the add you are now up to 10 per acre which should be enough for 40% Coontail infestation. However, I would also manually remove whatever I could at first, because there is a point where the coontail just explodes and does not stay in line with stocking rates. If you are at the legal limit you need to help those fish get over the hump, once they do it will be reduced anually. And the water should not be turbid. If you pull coontail slowly it usually just comes up from the bottom, where the carp are not that effective. Drag that mass out and let it die in the sun.

Chad, you are just not going to make it. 9 per acre with 75% coverage is so far below needed stocking rates it is just never going to happen. Never. I'd almost triple that if I could, get near 25 per. Muddy water is not a concern, because they are not really a turbid fish. And time is irrelavant. Could be 3 years, could be 30. And you won't see anything. That stocking rate is not even keeping up with the new growth. It is not going to be some magic number of years either. Same as Salex, you either bump the rates, and mechanical or herbicide to get the fish over the hump as I say. When they actually start knocking it down it slowly gets reduced. And Coontail will get eaten by Grass Carp, it is something they do inhale.

Mike, 5 Carp? What am I missing here? Is your pond 1/4 acre? It takes a lot of fish, soemtimes 20 per just to get going. And you are best off starting with bigger fish 12" or so. They have a lot better survival rate and are entering thier peak eating years.

Grass Carp will eat what they want, no doubt. And so many people have posted they are less than impressed with the results. Problem is they don't come with instruction manuals. And people put them in and hope for the best.

Here are some thoughts:

Plant them for soft material, pondweed, hydrilla, elodea, coontail.

Don't bother with hard stemmed stuff, cattails, rushes, lilies as they can't eat it.

Sometimes they will avoid something you want them to eat, Eurasian Milfoil is one of those that sometimes good, sometimes no good.

Stocking rates and proper size are key, people say they either work or don't work. What is really happening is they either get over the hump and start taking stuff down, or they can't keep up.

Don't get them for algae, duckweed or azolla. And they are not turbid fish, they just don't roil around in the mud like common carp.

Sorry to be the bearer of bad news but just so much questionable info in this thread I decided to throw some known facts out here. Now, off to my coontail pond, where I will drag a little more out of the pond, and cull out 100 or more 3' and below bg. Like everyone else, this customer can't fish with coontail, who can?

Last edited by The Pond Frog; 05/19/10 02:23 PM.