I've been actively managing my bass pond for almost two years now. It's a standard BG/LMB (and gambusia) pond. It's 1.75 acres and 20 feet deep in the middle. My goal for this pond is to be able to catch decent sized LMB regularly and to catch big ones occasionally. I don't care about catching BG at all.
In the last two years I've added a fair amount of cover. Installed a feeder to throw out GFC for the BG. And I've been harvesting every bass that's less than 90-95% relative weight. My tracking spreadsheet is
here if you're interested. We're catching bigger fish and releasing more that are the right weight. But there are still lots that are skinny. I know it takes time though. If you have any thoughts on my tracking sheet please let me know.
My main question now is whether I should be harvesting any BG. We used to only see (and catch) big BG. Now we're seeing more sizes. But it's still heavily tilted toward the big ones. (I would consider "big" to be over 8 inches.) I've seen two different ideas on this forum: 1) don't harvest any BG because their spawn is what the LMB will eat. 2) harvest BG to shape their population to fit the LMB's needs.
I would lean toward #2, but I'm not sure. If I go with #2 how do I decide what to harvest?
I know you like pics, so here's a recent harvest of skinny bass. It's the 4/30/2011 harvest on the spreadsheet.
