I would like to build a trophy yellow perch pond some time down the road. I would like to gain as much knowledge on the topic as I possibly can.
Thanks
How big of a pond should be constructed?
Personally as far as size of the pond I wouldn't build one under 0.5 acres, but if you have no choice a smaller one will do, if you go with females only and you feed pellets.
In Missouri you won't have any concerns of winterkill due to long periods of ice cover accompanied by deep snow, but really large perch can get stressed by high water temps in the summer. I would go with a minimum of 8 feet with at least 25 percent of the water at 8 feet or more. I would strongly suggest diffusion aeration to keep plenty of oxygen in the depths during summer, but only run it at night.
One sex only and females only would be the way to go if you seriously want bruiser perch. The females get the largest and grow the fastest. This would also prevent a multitude of potentially stunted perch as yellow perch are prolific spawners. You can still grow big feed trained perch in the presence of smaller perch but the smaller perch are notorious bait stealers and can get annoying.
Bill Cody (aka Dr. Perca) had both sexes but he religiously removes egg masses, and has some saugeye or walleye in the pond to prey on the offspring. He produces some dandy perch in his pond. Hopefully Bill will chime in as he is my mentor when it comes to producing trophy size yellow perch. I owe a lot of what I have learned from Bill Cody.
If you can, build two ponds: One small pond for stocking all the yellow perch you purchase from a producer, and when you can sex them in the spring (not hard to do) only put the females in your trophy pond. The males in the alternate pond you can thin from time to time as a kiddy pond or for the table. Most likely you won't get a producer to sell you only females, but it is possible you can get mature ones that you can sex at the pond edge and only plant the females in the main pond. Yellow perch sexually mature as early as 5 inches.
When I used to get my perch from a producer I would put them in cages if I couldn't sex them right away and sex them the following year. I also didn't have an extra pond for the males so I kept them in cages.
I now have a small 1/10 acre pond where I produce my own perch and feed train them at night with a belt feeder and light. But fall I have all the 5 to 7 inch perch I need.
You can do YP only, but they also do well with bluegills -- possibly male only bluegills -- if you want big bluegills in addition to the large yellow perch. I find feed trained smallies do O.K. with yellow perch, but I would discourage largemouths. Largemouths can wipe them out and intimidate panfish away from the pellets at feeding time. I had that happen even if the largemouths are feed trained.
If you want the fastest growth and ultimately large numbers of trophy perch I would feed. That way they are not dependent on the carrying capacity of your pond. My pellet fed fish are 3 to 4 years ahead of their natural feed counterparts in the area local lakes. Aquamax is a good choice.
Here's my biggest at 16 1/4 inches and 2 lbs. 13 oz. She would have shattered the state record by 5 oz. if my state would have allowed me to enter her. Feeding fish was considered an unfair advantage. Apparently my DNR doesn't know how common feeding fish in ponds is.
