Pond Boss Forums STOCKING A NEW POND Creating the food chain What are the challanges of a Bluegill only pond?

If I decide to abandon LMB for Bluegill only, can I build a quality pond if I fish it several times a year? I'm concerned recruitment would be to heavy and I would end up with a bunch of stunted fish. If the water is cool with that inhibit recruitment. I tried searching for links about BG only pond but can't find any matches. Does anyone know of a good thread?

BG alone will eventually stunt. They spawn up to 4 times a year. I doubt you could fish it enough to keep them under control.

The only way I would have a bluegill only pond is male only fish.

is it hard to reliably get male only BG?

Yes and no. Doubtful a supplier will sort for you even if you pay him extra. However what I and some others have done here is grow them out in a cage or seperate pond and sort ourselves.. I hatch and grow out my own in a seperate pond for complete control. If you can purchase them large enough from a supplier you may be able to sort out the males for the pond and cook up the females.

Larger mature fish are easier to sex and it has to be done during spawning time for 100 percent success. If you have even the slightest doubt of the sex of the fish it doesn't go into the pond.

Some day I will hatch my bluegills indoors and make them all males by adding a male hormone to the feed. Most fish are sexless early in their life cycle and adding male hormones wiill make rhem male and adding female hormones will make them female.

Keep in mind my fish are not sold for consumption so I can get away with this. I will also have to treat the wastewater from that particular tank.

As mentioned mixed sex bluegill will easily create several thousand small BG each year in most ponds. This will quickly lead to overpopulation, over eating the foods available and slow growth and even stunting. To minimize this it takes significant predation of fry and young ones, or manual strong population reduction.
Easiest way to get male only BG is to go somewhere and catch your own BG. I prefer to catch and use pellet fed or trained BG. To know you are getting good or rapid growing BG individuals should be around 7.5 to 8" long before you can reliably and accurately determine male from female. Smaller easily recognizable males are generally slower growers, often stunted as noted in Part2 of the articles below. Identifying male BG is not all that difficult once you learn the key features to look for in each population. There has been quite a bit of info posted here about features of male and female BG. Do your homework and ask questions if necessary. In some bodies of water the males and females will look slightly different than the stand adult BG. You may need some advice initially with specific photographs depending on your situation. Do a Google search for Pond Boss male female bluegill or similar words. We can provide identifications of BG you are not sure about if you take a picture and post it here. Best rule is when in doubt throw it out.
Here are a couple links to get you started.
http://forums.pondboss.com/ubbthreads.php?ubb=showflat&Number=21481

http://forums.pondboss.com/ubbthreads.php?ubb=showflat&Number=319582

http://forums.pondboss.com/ubbthreads.php?ubb=showflat&Number=113763

Bluegill options in small ponds
http://forums.pondboss.com/ubbthreads.php?ubb=showflat&Number=189988

If you are serious about using just male bluegill you should consider reading these three articles in back issues of PBoss magazine.

BEHEMOTH BLUEGILLS IN SMALL PONDS. In Part I, Cody, Condello and Baird provide the necessary details of how to accurately sex bluegills as the first step to produce trophies in small waters. Mar-Apr 2006.

GROWING BEHEMOTH MALE BLUEGILLS; Part II. Cody, Condello and Baird present info about size, growth, stocking densities, and choosing proper male bluegills. May-Jun 2006.

THE ART OF MANAGING BEHEMOTH MALE BLUEGILLS.Part3. Cody, Condello and Baird conclude their three part article about raising trophy male bluegills. Discussed are best size of ponds, natural foods, supplemental feeding, angling implications, females only, and creative ways to use male bluegills. A standard weight table for bluegill is included. Jul-Aug 2006.

"When in doubt throw it out". Been my misfortune many many times.

I second Bill's advice on the back issues. The three part series he referenced is what got me started on trying to raise large bluegills.

The axioms I live by Bob are: "As a last resort read the directions," and, "If it doesn't work hit it a lick."

Cecil, when we seined your large pond, how many BG did we run across that we just weren't 100% sure and put them in with the "I know these are females" group? Those were large ones too.

In my main pond I cull small BG and most of what I figure are medium to large females. After many years of doing this, I'm still sometimes surprised when I find milt in an 8-9 inch "female" that I'm filleting.

I don't have a link to "The Secret Sex Life of Bluegills" written by our late/great friend Dr. Dave Willis and published in Pond Boss a number of years ago. But, he reported on the many sexual orientations of bluegill, including the transgendered.

I think this is the link that Catmandoo was referring to for Dr.Willis' article The Secret Sex Life of Bluegills.
http://www.sdstate.edu/nrm/outreach/pond/upload/The-Secret-Life-of-Bluegill-Jul-Aug-2005.pdf

Seriously Bill, How do you pull these articles so fast?

ewest is a much faster "gun" and with more guns in this town. He is our 'bestest' librarian on Pond Boss Forum.

That was scary. I thought you said he was a libertarian.

I would be good either way!

One thing that I wonder about from the quoted article, how do we get so much reproduction from a newly stocked pond where the fish are only a couple of years old?

Nature obviously causes at least some of the fish to mature early in absence of larger mature males and females.

But if these fish matured early and put energy to reproductive organs, how can the first batch of fish get so big so quick? I've heard it said that it is hard to get subsequent generations to perform as well as the original stocking. Yet these original fish stocked must mature early, don't they? How do they grow gonads and size at the same time?

Seems there is some conflicts in there somewhere. Maybe I just think too much.

Thanks Mr. Cody. Yes, that is the article I was thinking of.

snrub, less competition for the available food in the pond.