Hi Don- Just wanted to say HI to a fellow Ontarian and that I have a big of info for you about my own pond which is much smaller than yours! My pond is 1/4 acre or shade less and I stocked a bit of everything back when we bought the place in 2008. Originally the owner just had LMB in the pond and nothing else (although I did catch one sucker back in 2009 and I am positive the very same fish died of old age last week as it was floating and I cought a nice SMB back in 2010 but I havn't seen it again).
The fall I bought the place I stocked aprox 50 Pumpkinseeds, 50 Bluegills and 200 YP from 5-12" and 6 3Lbs LMB. I also stocked 40 Rainbow trout that fall that were 16-20" long with the intent of removing them in the spring.
The following spring the family had a blast with the trout and we left 10 in and they lived for the next 2 years until I had the pond turn over on me durring a severe thunder storm.
After having such a blast with the Rainbow's I decieded to stock other trout instead each fall and landed up going with Brookies as the main stocker (these have to be taken out by early summer although this year I am pumping well water in to see if I can get them to live all year long). I also have stocked 10 brown trout that have lived for 3 years now.
You may be shocked at the amount I have stocked but I can tell you that non of the panfish have over populated and neither have the LMB and I firmly believe this is due to the preditor trout (the browns).
One cool thing that I have noticed since I started stocking the Brook Trout and feeding them hard all fall, winter and spring is that the Wild YP and Bluegills are actually becoming feed trained (the YP flock to the dock as soon as pellets hit the water).
In your pond, if you are wanting to control the pan fish and not wanting to stock LMB I would really think about stocking 5-10 Brown's...they should live all year long for you and are actually hard to catch after the first time you hook them! and they will control the panfish.
Fall is the time to stock them and you will have no worries about them spawning in the pond and they are available from quite a few places here in Ontario!
Ryan
