Pond Boss Forums MANAGING AN EXISTING POND Evaluating and adjusting fish populations Cormorants?

Not sure where to put this post.

We have a .75 acre private pond in the U.P. of MI. that we just stocked with hybrid BG. A little over 200 to start with. We want to manage it for BG. Approx. 80% of the bank is covered with Alder brush. About 10% of the surface has Lilly pads. Until we stocked it the only life in the pond was minnows, frogs, and turtles. There are Cormorants in the area. We intend to introduce Walleye next year to help control the BG population.

Our fear is that the Cormorants will cause the size of the BG to stay smallish.

Is there a way to keep these guys away? No one lives on the property.

Will they, in the long run, help with the management?

I'm sure there are other guestions to ask, but for now I can't think of any others.

rick r.

Hello, Rick. Always good to hear from a Yooper.

My thought is that Cormorants can cause your BG to disappear, not stunt. IIRC Bob Lusk once wrote of a LMB pond where Cormorants removed so many of the bass the remaining ones grew to exceptional size, due to the large remaining available food for what few were left; things happened to balance out just right in that case. It seems like their predation on HBG would also leave more food for the survivors.

Try doing a search for "cormorant" or "water turkey" in the Questions & Observations category; there are 40 or so threads about these menaces. Several of the Texas PMs have, unfortunately for them, lots of experience with water turkeys. They also bother fish lovers elsewhere as you know.

For serious information on Cormorants, do not read any thread on them I started.

TG,
Actually, I'm a yooper wannabe. My wife is a yooper, but we live in N. VA. We share a "camp" in the U.P. with her sister and her husband. I see you are showing Central Ohio. I was born and raised in Springfield.

My concern about stunting comes from the large amount of Alder brush growing around the bank. There is a lot of cover there for smaller fish, while larger fish, I'm thinking, will be cruising the edges, or maybe even open water. Or, am I way off on that?

I'm probably going about this backwards, but we've wanted BG's in this water for a long time. So, the stocking is done. Now we're learning how to control them.

Looks like this site is going to be a big help.

rick r.

If I'm about to resail waters you've already charted, excuse and ignore.

Hybrid Bluegill sold commercially are invariably BG crossed with Green Sunfish (GSF). HBG of any variant have greatly reduced fertility wrt regular BG, largely because they are primarliry of just one sex. Almost all species combos, including BGxGSF, are predominantly male - by some studies as high as 97%!

If you read through the many (many, many) threads on HBG here, you will see a lot of spirited discussions on their purported merits and drawbacks. For your goal of managing 3/4 acre "for BG", I think they should prove quite accectable. They primary drawback will be the need to restock more as your original HBG are depleted.

Without getting into a long winded or longhaired discussion (plenty of both are available in existing threads for you to read if interested), the relatively small numbers of offspring that HBG do produce are not as desirable as the original stockers. Personally I don't have much of an idea how Walleye would do to control these "F2+" offspring, or how Walleye do themselves inthis situation, but like many here I am interested in finding out.

Eyes when small should do ok on reducing the smaller # of F2s while both are small but the eyes will need bigger prey ( bigger than swim up/yoy F2s) as they grow. You may need to add some FH (fathead minnows) for both the bigger HBG and Eyes to eat. Studies have shown that Eyes do well on FH.

Thanks for the reply's gentlemen. A lot of good info here.

Rick R.