Pond Boss Forums INTRO Questions & Observations vanishing yellow perch

In the four years since I built my pond, I have stocked at least (200) 4-7 inch yellow perch. This fall in about 20 hours of fishing I have caught three. The pond is about an acre and 14 feet deep max. There is a lot of structure. The first year that I stocked the pond, I put in 100 bass fingerlings, 100 blue gill fingerlings, and 50 channel catfish fingerlings. Three catfish I caught last weekend were 28 inches long. Could they be preying on the perch?

Hi Mr Bill

I have a similar case of disappearing YP in my main pond, too. YP are fusiform and are more easily utilized as forage by apex predators in your pond [CC and LMB] - so their population is affected, especially in smaller BOWs like yours and mine. In my case I have WE, SMB and HSB which are the predators responsible for their population decline.

I am supplementally stocking YP in hopes to re-establish their presence in the fishery. I am buying 200 2-3" YP each Spring, caging and feeding AM, and releasing the the Fall at around 5-8". I don't have any evidence this is yet working - but it's worth the effort [and is fun] IMO.

Also, because YP are such an important fish to me, I am dedicating a .45 acre micro pond [formerly serving as my SMB reproduction pond] to F YP and M BG and will feed it heavily. My goal is to create a trophy BG and YP fishery come hell or highwater...and a micro pond with limited species is far easier to manage in order to achieve those goals.

If YP are important to you I'd recommend supplemental stocking of advanced fish and/or consider a micro pond specialty fishery if you have that option.

Teehjaeh57,

Thanks for the info. I also have a smaller pond that is stocked with fathead minnows and yellow perch. That is where I get the fifty or so that I stock every year. I think I am going to reduce the number of catfish down to ten or so. (I like them smoked). The largest bass I have seen is only about 15 inches so I don't think they are getting too many.

LMB at 15" will eat YP up to 8". If you are a larger bass why eat a 4" YP when you can have a 6"-8" one? Numerous LMB smaller than 12" in absence of good weed cover will usually eliminate most, if not all the younger YP. LMB are really "hard" on YP recruitment. Expect each 8"-15" LMB to eat about 200-240 YP or similar fish per year. CC can also eat quite a few YP who are inactive on the bottom at night when CC are most active hunting for food. I have seen significiant predation of YP by larger CC (20"-30") in smaller ponds.

Thank you Cody I needed that info myself.

Mr. Bill keep up your supplemental stocking in your main pond and if your LMB aren't thriving [WR 100+] thin some out along with your CC. This might help your YP population rebound.

Of course, if you REALLY wanted to go an extreme route you could drain, seine out trophy fish to your smaller BOW, lime [nuke], remove morts and start over in the Spring with SMB, YP, HSB, and RES or BRES or HBG and start feeding. Use bluntnose minnows, spotfin shiners, maybe some other "alternative" forage source to keep your fish growing. These fish may do a little better than LMB and CC up North a ways. Beauty of a 1 acre pond or less is that it's pretty easy to start anew.

teehjaeh57,
Thanks again for the additional info. I have a third pond about .25 acre that is stocked with fathead minnows. There are also bullfrog and green frog tadpoles. I feed and trap these weekly 300 to 500 minnows and 200 to 400 tadpoles that I put into the large pond. The second pond with the YP and fatheads also has these large tadpoles. I often trap them out and put them in the large pond too. The other thing that I have noticed in my big pond is that there are no small (2-4") blue gills. When I feed aquamax in the big pond, I usually see around a hundred (8-10") BG and maybe 15 or 20 of the large CC. When I feed the tadpoles and minnows, I usually see 15 or 20 LMB 12-15".

Your LMB likely are exhausting their food chain hammering YP and BG in that size range [2-6"]. Good news is your adult YP and BG should be pretty solid fish that have grown beyond predation range due to lack of competition for forage. Bad news is you may have a bottleneck of skinny, hungry [low WR] LMB.

Depending on your goals this is good or bad. If you want more trophy LMB reduce their population - take out all skinny or bottlenecked LMB 12-15" you can catch. Leave healthy LMB in the fishery. Also consider harvesting any CC you catch. Both these actions will help take the pressure off your BG and YP populations.

If you don't mind high population of LMB and want a trophy BG/YP pond you can keep density of predators [CC and LMB] high and continue to supplementally stock adult YP annually.

What are your goals?

teehjaeh57,

Thanks again for the advice. I guess goals for the pond are: (yp and bg for ice fishing and grandchildren. Maybe an occasional large LMB or CC for a surprise. I built a four foot cube pen per inst. I found on other posts. If I put the 4-5" YP that I normally stock in the pond in the cage, would they take to pellets (small aquamax)?

To get YP and other non-pellet trained fish to eat pellets in a cage, it takes some concerted effort. For first timers this can be frustruating and often not very unsuccessful. Pellet training in a cage is not as simple as tossing pellets into a cage. Often it is much quicker, easier and often more successful to just buy the fish already pellet trained, even if it costs a little more in time and money. This is especially true for beginners. In the end it will actually save time as you wont spend time training the fish to eat pellets which can be time consuming if done correctly, which results in a high success rate - IMO and experience. There are previous topics here about various ways to train fish to eat pellets. IMO the training technique for fish in a cage is different than pellet training fish in a pond because pond fish can still get natural foods but caged fish cannot. Caged fish are also under added stressors which makes it more important to get good food intake to maintain health. I don't think there is an Common Q&A archive subject sheet for this topic.

Bassically feed training involves first getting contained fish to eat some sort of damp natural food such as rehydrated krill, chopped worms, fish, crayfish, shrimp, clams, etc. Once they are eating the damp natural food then the best proceedure in my experience is gradually introducing damp fish pellets (high protein 40%+) with the wet natural foods, then gradually reducing natural items and increasing the damp pellets. This process usually takes 7-14 days for me. When fish are eating the damp pellets gradually make pellets drier and drier until they are completly dry. So you see, the process is sort of involved and buying pellet trained fingerlings is usually easier and much quicker unless one cannot find pellet trained fish. One important facet is to get the fish eating some sort of food asap once they are in a cage which is a pretty stressful enviornment for them. You do not want them to become sick or with fungus while in the cage then mortality and losses are usually very high. Again - buying pellet trained stockers is usaully the better way to proceed when putting fish in a cage. Even with pellet trained stockers they sometimes do not readily accept pellets and this depends of the source or supplier which is usually VERY important.

Bill thanks for the advice. I think you have convinced me to hold off on cage rearing YP until I retire and can devote the necessary time to do it right. From what I have gathered here, probably the best thing I can do now to achieve my goals is to catch as many of the CC and a number of the less fit LMB out to allow the forage fish YP and BG to increase their numbers.
One last question, I am going to continue to move 4-7" perch from my second pond down to pond one. Is there a method any of you recommend to mark these fish for future identification. If I catch one two or three years from now, I would like to know when I may have stocked it. Thanks.

Good idea to remove LMB and CC. There is a local pond (0.3ac) with YP and LMB. YP were not recruiting. Owner now removes every LMB he catches and after lots of bass removed is beginning to see some YP recruits.

You can clip a fin...I have not done this, but many on the forum have experience doing so and can share their wisdom.

I have clipped fins and dorsal spines of some adult perch. The fins fairly quickly regrow and one has to look very closely to see the original clip marks. As with other fish as long as the fish size groups always appear plump and well fed you can usually assume good growth rates. For me this is true if your largest YP are continually getting larger until harvest or mortality. Old YP grow slower than 2 and 3 yr old perch but old fish do gain length and body weight each year. If your YP are topping out at around 9" to 11" long they are probably food limited and or too crowded. A two year old female YP can be 10"-11" long whereas an underfed male YP at 2 yrs can be 4"-5" and the well fed male will be 7"-9". For YP, females grow faster than males.