John,
First -- welcome to Pond Boss.
I know your pain. Been there - done that. Not a happy outcome, although I did catch two very healthy red-eared sunfish last year that were about 12-13 inches. So at least a few have survived my feeble attempts.
I've tried and failed several times because of the 2-3 inch size. If you can make a proper cage, and you can tend it nearly daily, I believe you can grow them to a successful size that won't get eaten as soon as they are let loose in the pond.
I first tried a "blocking net" made from a seine. I obviously didn't have enough weight on the bottom, and things slipped in and out. It is amazing how fast a 10-inch bass can slip under such a net. Eric West has some good posts here somewhere about blocking nets. I'll see if I can find the posts.
The next time, I tried a commercial fish "basket" (like those for keeping fish rather than using a stringer), a fish cage made from plastic fencing, and again with the seine, but with more weights. All failed miserably. The basket and the cage both grew massive amounts of algae within about a week, and the fish started to die, so I let the few survivers loose. I don't have any idea what happened to the fish behind the blocking net, but they disappeared.
There are some real good posts on here by Bill Cody and Cecil Baird about building fish cages. They also had a series of articles in Pond Boss magazine on proper building of cages. They should work, and they are both experts.
As for feeding, I started with dried krill. They loved it. I added redworms from my worm farm. They loved them. I started to grind up floating pellets, but they were mostly gone or dead by the time I got them to eating pellet food.
This year I'm hoping I'll have time to try
Barrel-Ponics. I've got the barrels. I bought a 600 GPH pump for $39 at Harbor Freight while on my way to Pond Boss IV.
Good luck, and I'm sure lots of others will chime in. Keep us posted.
Ken
