Pond Boss Forums INTRO Questions & Observations Pond Bugs

Walt, Yes I would stock RES now or as soon as you can get them. Then next spring stock the BG. This assumes that you want more emphasis on RES than BG which may not be the case for you. IMO stocking RES first will result in the RES initially having a stronger presence compared to if RES and BG were stocked together. Another option with similar results would be to stock larger sized RES 4"-6" and more of them per acre than the BG 2"-3". In this case RES should spawn one year before the BG. This, at least initially, gives the RES a stronger presence. Why more emphasis of RES. They produce fewer offspring thus less of a tendency of overpopulating with predators such as WE, SMB or HSB that are not well known for their strong predatory tendencies for the sunfish types.

Another option is to not stock BG until you see a real need for more small panfish to feed the predators due to slow predator growth. Although if the non-reproducing predators are growing too slow due to food shortages, just remove some of them so more foods are available for remaining predators. If you don't have too many or very predators then it takes fewer forage fish to feed them. With non-reproducing predators (HSB-WE) one has more control of the numbers of predators and it becomes somewhat easier to manage the fishery so forage fish are usually abundant but not too abundant and all are "doing well' or growing good.

Not using LMB with BG is IMO 'risky business' and experimental due to the tendency of other non-LMB predators not being ideal predators of BG. If you do this stocking plan, please keep us informed as to your experiences and the pond's progress so others can learn more about the success of non-traditional fish combinations.

No matter what stocking plan you use, IMO when the BG are added you will eventually see a need to add LMB to exert enough predatory pressure on the everincreasing numbers or abundant BG to control them and get good growth rates of the BG population to produce common harvestable sizes of BG.

There is a fish farm not too far from you that supposedly sells larger sized pellet raised RES (5"-6"). Feeding the RES pellets will result in faster growing RES, at least the pellet eaters and the pond will be able to grow more numbers of RES due to some eating pellets and less natural foods resulting in more natural foods for other RES. Keep in mind that the RES offspring will NOT eat pellets very well, and to maintain pellet eating RES you will need to periodically restock pellet trained, larger sized 4-6" RES. Larger sized ones to insure better survival. PM me for contact of the fish farm with pellet trained RES.

Also remember if you use this non-BG-LMB stocking combination it will be relatively easy to convert your pond into a LMB-BG pond by simply stocking BG and LMB. Over time (4-6yrs) they will become the dominant fishes in the pond. This is not the case if you start with BG-LMB. Changing the predominant fishes in the initial BG-LMB pond is almost impossible without renovating and starting over.