Pond Boss Forums STOCKING A NEW POND Types of fish to choose Stocking Blue Catfish?

Hello, Im looking at stocking a new soon to be dug Pond with Blue catfish in the future. It will be just under a 1/2 acre in size. Im located in South East Texas. Any info on the fish breed would help. Thanks

Welcome to the forum! Why Blues vs. Channel Cats?

Thanks! Well good question, I was told Blues would get larger.

Yes they will, but in any body of water, it will only support "X" number of pounds of fish per surface acre. Aeration and feeding will allow you to have more pounds of fish per acre. Channels will take a while to get large, but then again, everybody's definition of large is different.

Once catfish get larger than 3#-4# they start targeting fish for their main food source. So, those forage fish add to the fish biomass in the pond.

CC, if caught and released get VERY hard to re-catch. I'm not sure about Blues.

What size fish (and how many) were you expecting to grow in that pond?

Bluecats get alot bigger and are alot more aggressive as it comes to feeding. I would stock large numbers of CNB and maybe even crappie because they overpopulate so bad. A person should stock shad also.

Whereabouts in southeast tx?

Ok, good info guys! Im located on the gulf coast. 90 miles South east of Houston texas. So Crappie would be a good fish to add to the pond?

Beaumont texas

Crappie will overpopulate almost all the time if you want to raise just Bluecats and dont care about anything else my opinion would be use them as a last resort forage but if you don't care about any other fish they would be great feed for bluecats

Think of the words biomass and dissolved oxygen crash. A body of water can only hold a certain # of pounds of fish. That's the biomass. It's a matter of the dissolved oxygen that will support the population. Crappie, bluegills and bass spawn and over spawn in a 1/2 acre pond.

Bluecats, when the get bigger, need big food to sustain themselves.

So, to have BC's, you have to have a lot of large prey. But to get there, you need a LOT of fish turning into big prey. That leads to the dissolved oxygen problem.

Thanks for the info fellas!

Around here blue cats have been caught over 80 lbs. I'm sure there are bigger ones in TX.

Anyone have any idea how stocking blue cats will alter the dynamics of a pond overtaken by 1-3 lb common carp?

Right now I'm planning to stock 500 8-10" BCs in a 20 acre lake this fall. I was hoping to turn it into a trophy catfishery rather than a carp fishery.

Few thoughts:

I'd say BC or FHC are your best options for managing CC population. I know the FHC gape is unsurpassed, and CC are a preferred forage item for FHC.

Is starting over an option due to CC invasion?

If you need help sourcing fish, let me know I can put you in contact with some good NE guys.

Thanks for the response TJ. Yes, starting over is an option and something I had been planning on doing. But with a 2 year old and 3 year old son I decided to push that off 12-15 years until they can be a part of it, and have some ownership in the project. Maybe it would be a good FFA project for them in high school.

In the meantime, I'd like to experiment with BC or FHCs just to see what type of impact they'd have on the CC. And I'd just love to have a pond full of monster cats

...........and I would love to have a buddy who owns a pond full of monster cats!!!!

20 acres is one thing no way I would put them in a 1 acre pond or smaller. There just not meant for it.... Your asking for trouble down the road.

Read what DD1 said he put it in black and white for you. You will have D.O. or biomass issues sooner or later.....

RC

Biomass and DO would be a concern. But right now all I have is a pond full of trash fish. So I don't really have much to lose. Like I said above, a future Rotenone treatment and start over is hopefully in the works anyway. So my situation is somewhat unique in that I don't have much to lose.

Single sex BC or two can be used as a BG [or other panfish] management tool per George. Once it hits 10# IIRC he removes and stocks another to help cull those 3-7" CNBG. Otherwise stocking any predator with that top end size potential in a small BOW is probably not a wise strategy per Dave.

Can apply hydrated lime, spike PH to 11, collect fish. Much cheaper than rotenone. 20 acre blank canvas seems like quite an inviting proposition. I'd personally chop it up into 4 five ac ponds with dykes and get very creative with specialized trophy fisheries...just a thought!

Hmmm......... I may have to look into the hydrated lime treatment. Thanks.

With the size that common carp get, and their fecundity, I'd be leaning towards both Flatheads and Blues.

If you kill and start over, what's the possibility of them getting into the BOW(s) again??

I don't think there's a way for CC to get established again. I believe the previous owner put them in the pond. Either that or there was a pond upstream with them in it that has since been filled in.

Before I jump the gun again on recommending nuking the existing fishery and starting over, it would be a cool experiment to stock FHC and BC and monitor their performance. Since Corey is planning on starting over down the road anyhow, if he stocked 25-50 BC and FHC per acre this Fall he might end up with a nice sized BOW featuring trophy cats [and probably trophy BG and LMB - the few one could manage to catch]. I think BC and FHC can grow pretty fast - in 3 years might have some fish pushing 20#. I haven't been trophy catfishing in a long time...my muskie rods and level winds need a workout!

That's my line of thinking. It took me 5-10 of trying to get rid of carp til I thought of moving on to a trophy catfishery and it only took you one afternoon. But I don't think it's a bad idea. I don't have any problem with catching monster cats.