I had put 10 BG originally before I found out I could get some RES in the fall of 2013. In Mar of 2013 had put FHM in at the same time I stocked the big pond. As far as I knew then the FHM were the only fish in there besides some small minnows I had seen in the puddle left. So I had put the 10 BG in caught from the main pond that fall and I think they were probably 6" then. So at that point all I thought was in there was FHM and 10 BG. Then found out I could get some 3" RES and put 125 in main pond and 125 in this old pond. Would have bought more but that was all he had. That is when I thought I would try to make the pond heavy with RES. Just leave the original 10 BG that were already in there and the 125 RES along with the FHM and let them reproduce till I saw the need for predators, then put in a few LMB as needed out of my main pond.
Then I caught the first GSF. And the news got worse from there as I found out the GSF had spawned so I had lots of them as well as lots of BH. That is the point we discussed my options in another thread earlier this year. I gave up on the mostly RES pond because of your story expressed above about the GSF eating all the new eggs and fry of the desirable species. And I think that is exactly what has happened.
If I were dependent on buying fish to stock my best bet may have been to have killed the pond and start over. Larger size stocking fish are harder to come by and expensive "here".
But where I seemed to have abundant reproduction of BG in my main pond I just changed the goals for the pond and decided to remove as many GSF and BH as I had time and add BG (and hopefully later RES if my forage pond and sediment pond will produce RES) from my main pond. Where I could raise my own larger size BG stocking fish I thought that was a viable alternative. Plus in the mean time the few hybrid BG that were mixed in with my regular BG in the main pond I really liked. So after Dave Davidsons comments about liking GSF and my experience with the hybrids, decided the GSF in there would not be such a bad thing if I could manage around them and get other more desirable fish established.
To date I have added probably around 250 additional BG to the original 10 that ranged from 3" to 6" with the bulk of them being 4-5". Every time I go out fishing I keep a 5 gallon bucket with water in it and when I catch a small BG, it goes to the old pond. This size appears to me to be from the first spawn from the summer of 2013 from my original fingerling BG placed in March of 2013. There seems to be a lot of the 4-5" size. My original stock BG are all in the 6-8" range with the bulk of them 7-7.5". They all get released in the same pond. My thinking is the 4-5" plentiful size is too big for my 12" LMB to eat so not suitable for food in my main pond, but big enough that they will not be eaten in the old pond by the GSF. My thinking also is that removing these 4-5" will make more room for biomass in the smaller sizes next spring when the BG and FHM spawn again to feed the new LMB spawn that should happen then. I hope by removing some of these 4-5" size class I'm helping both my big pond by removing them and the old pond by putting them in it. Hope I'm not harming my fish population in my big pond. From what I have read here on PBF, it seems the original 8" mature BG should provide adequate spawning to provide new BG for the big pond. That is the assumption I going on. If it is incorrect, please let me know.
So I'll probably keep adding 4-5" BG from the big pond into the old pond this fall as I catch them. Maybe 100-200 more before the season ends and I head for warmer climates and looking at fish under water instead of above. Then wait and see what happens to the spawn and recruitment next spring in the old pond. Hopefully I start catching about half BG in the minnow traps by late summer along with the GSF I have been catching. So far I have only caught a couple of BG in the minnow traps that I thought were recruitment and not something I had transferred into the pond. Out of hundreds of small GSF I've removed, that is not much.
So that is kind of where the old pond stands to date. We have removed gobs of GSF and BH, eating a few of the larger BH's, and been adding 4-5" BG as we catch them. And we have a half dozen 11-12" LMB in there now working on the GSF also, that should spawn next spring.
Edit: I've also moved probably 20 hybrid BG/GSF from my main pond to the old pond as I caught them. They are usually about 8" now, the ones I have re-caught from the old pond.
Last edited by snrub; 10/14/14 11:22 AM.
