Originally Posted By: teehjaeh57
Originally Posted By: anthropic
Originally Posted By: sprkplug
I can buy into that. If a BOW is infertile to begin with, then maybe there will be some benefit. However I still question whether or not you are feeding the fish directly, or applying fertilizer by feeding sinking pellets. Stimulating the natural forage chain by fertilization sounds great, but I'm not sure high dollar fish pellets would be my first choice in that application, were I the one tasked with paying for the feed.

I read a little on the American Sportfish page. I think the statement that Coppernose Bluegills take to feed more readily than "common"? bluegills might be worthy of it's own investigation.


Yeah, my pond to be is located on an acidic pine plantation. I'll have to lime as the water will likely be rather infertile otherwise. Don't want to use feed purely as fertilizer, of course, but I could tolerate a limited amount of uneaten stuff.


Anth - good post, this makes sense in your scenario it seems. Little extra nutrient level isn't going to impact your fishery or water negatively. Up here on my ponds it's all we can do to try and avoid excess loads. Less room for error - that's why I feed in short bursts [1-2 seconds] 10-15 minutes apart so fewer pellets will drift to banks or sink. Sinking food for me is only used in cages when feed training BG, YP, SMB, etc - and that's a AM 400 float sink. I still see a lot of it ending up on pond bottom with my AquaVu micro camera...rarely witness fish clean it up from pond bottom unfortunately.


T57, your reply reminds me of what I heard time and again at the PB Conference: it depends! I wish for more fertility and envy your situation, but if I were in your situation I'd wish for less fertility and envy my situation. The algae is always greener on the other guy's pond, I guess.

By the way, have you looked into Floating Biohaven Islands at all? Pricy, but they sound terrific for dealing with excess nutrient issues. If I eventually put in a brood pond packed with tilapia & freshwater prawns, I intend to use the Islands to keep things under control.

7ac 2015 CNBG RES FHM 2016 TP FLMB 2017 NLMB GSH L 2018 TP & 70 HSB PK 2019 TP RBT 2020 TFS TP 25 HSB 250 F1,L,RBT -206 2021 TFS TP GSH L,-312 2022 GSH TP CR TFS RBT -234, 2023 BG TP TFS NLMB, -160