Pond Boss Forums STOCKING A NEW POND Types of fish to choose Common Carp & Largemouth Bass

In the morning laughing happy in thier turbid muddy carp pond. In the evening floating in Friz's soup.

Focus on the goals, and not ones preferences.

Great advice Bill, Thanks

I think there should be a common carp in every Christmas stocking. Carp and zurek for all.

http://www.fishingfury.com/wp-content/uploads/2008/05/carp-love.jpg

I remember the first carp I caught as a kid, it was huge & I wanted to keep & eat it, my brother inlaw said no it's junk fish! So I whined until he said ok. I cleaned the fish & he was fryin them, mostly BG, he handed me the large fillet on a plate with a smile, I found out why they call them junk fish!!! tasted nasty! I took two bites then threw it away. He just laughed at me.
I love to catch them, good stong fight, I have been catching them with my fly rod & it's a great battle. they are spooky if you have heavy feet, or slap the water too hard, so it's a challenge as well to get them to take a fly. I wanted to add one to our pond to target with a fly rod & design flies.

I spoke to my dad's friend the other day and talked to him about some of the details of his carp raising operation.

He made it very clear he chose carp because of their ease in rearing and the fact that they produce a large amount of fish protein for use by him and his family. He uses carp for a number of things. He feeds them to his pigs when he has too many, he uses them as fertilizer for his crops and he uses them as people food.

He utilizes a monoculture method of raising carp. He does not have any other fish in his carp pond. He has considered using tilapia but they are illegal to stock in open waters in Virginia so that is not an option for him.

His carp pond is approximately 1.5 acres and has a maximum depth of 6 feet with a "seining shelf" that is between 3 and 4 feet deep and the bank of the pond is a 3:1 slope. The pond is spring fed, but the water quality of this spring is very nutrient rich as it contains run off from his barnyard area where he raises livestock. This makes the water very fertile. He chose this pond to be his carp pond because of this run off issue. His other ponds are also spring fed, but are more pristine and are capable of supporting trout year round.

He typically maintains a brood stock of about 50 adult carp in the 4-8 pound range. These fish are allowed to naturally spawn in a shallow cove area of the pond that contains aquatic vegetation. According to him, the pond typically produces around 20,000 1"-3" YOY carp. He seines out about half of these fish to feed to his pigs and use as fertilizer. He then focuses on the remaining fish. By the end of the first growing season, the carp are in the 6" range and weigh around 6 oz. More fish are seined out during the following growing season as 1 year old fish. These fish are in the 10" range and are just under 1 pound and are also used for feeding his hogs and fertilizer. By the end of the second growing season, the fish are pushing 14" and are between 1 and 1 and half pounds. It is this size range he begin using them for food. Most fish are smoked and pickled and some are eaten fresh. Brooder fish that get over the 8 pound range are harvested as they have outgrown the manageable size. Often times the harvest of these fish are done in a more recreational manner such as fishing or bow fishing...

He estimates he produces around 400 pounds of carp per year for human consumption and another 2000 pounds are used to feed livestock and as fertilizer. He says the pond is very fertile because of the watershed being affected by the barnyard with lots of chickens, turkeys, goats, pigs and cows leaving their waste behind. He does use some supplemental feeding of field corn but he said the carp generally do fine on a diet of mostly natural feed. He did say about 2 weeks before harvest for human consumption, he feeds them heavily with corn as he says it makes them taste better.

I think his operation is a bit much for the average pond owner. 400 pounds of carp! Another 2000 pounds for other uses. That's a lot of fish!!! He has a few other ponds that he raises other species in including CC, LMB, BG and trout. He is an off the grid type of guy and provides almost everything he uses on his property.

Hopefully this gives you an idea what can be done with carp... I think if you put LMB into a carp pond, some of those YOY carp could be turned into LMB biomass. But I am not sure if LMB can even keep up with carp reproduction. Surprisingly, even with the numbers of carp kept in this 1.5 acre pond, it is not overly muddy. Perhaps it is the soil type the pond is on. It does typically have low clarity, but that is because of the fertility.

I hope this helps...

If things ever go real bad in the country this guy will be in good shape.

Never ate carp, how do they taste? are they better than GSF.

It's easy to laugh and joke about carp but they are the number #1 fish farmed in the entire world and one of the oldest if not the oldest species ever farmed. The real experts go with 4 different species in one pond to take advantage of different feeding habits. If you flush them out, keep them in a bathtub of clean water for a week to 10 days they taste way better, then you are just fighting the bones.

They are one of the smartest, most adaptable fish ever. It's just a cultural difference. So much so I can go to many freshwater resevoirs around me and catch a ton, no kidding, 2,000 pounds. But you have to flush them, I do the same with crawdads. Then you smoke them, put them in mason jars and pressure cook them, the bones just vanish. Even here in the states in Asian markets, #1 species is carp.

CJBS - Good info about raising carp. Thanks for taking time to gather more details from your dads' friend. If one is primarily interested in fish protein carp can fill that need. If you ever catch a 5-8 lb carp on light tackle you think you've hooked onto a slow moving lawn tractor.

Yes! I think this is way out of my league.
Thank you very much.
Regards,
FRIZ

Bill, if you think light tackle is fun, try it with a fly rod! I had to upgrade the equipment last year because I was afraid that I would break the rod. It was bending all the way down in the grip area. The new one has a drag system in the reel, so I won't have to be palming the spool now.

Thanks to George for suggesting what to buy - he was spot on.

No joke... He is preparing for the end literally. He's got more ammo than most 3rd world countries and enough guns to outfit a brigade. He actually has a waterwheel he has hooked up to a generator too. He uses no electricity other than what he produces. He produces what I would say would be 90-95% of the goods he uses. Visiting his place is pretty cool... 4 miles down a dirt road and surrounded by the Skyline Drive National park on 3 sides. About as remote as you can get east of the Mississippi.

IIRC, carp don't have the ability to store food as most fish do, so they have to feed more or less continually. Would this impact how they should be fed if on artificial feed, perhaps feeding multiple times during the day to prevent them from rooting and eating algae?

What about stocking some nice size Flatheads or Bluecats, they seem to enjoy goldfish and carp when they are on a jug line.

Just a thought.