Pond Boss Forums INTRO Questions & Observations Thinking about starting over?

Hi Tucker, welcome to the forum!

If I were you, I'd nuke the pond per previous direction - it's small and won't cost much nor pose much effort required to perform. Drain, seine and save any fish you want to keep or sell or donate to friends, then nuke remaining water. Hydrated lime worked well for me on pond same size, is cheap, and doesn't require licensed applicator. Then refill and determine a solid stocking plan prior to making bucket stocking mistakes again. If you want big lepomis then consider a single sex BG/HBG fishery and incorporate supplemental pellet feeding program. If you don't want to go single sex, then plan for dense population of apex predator [LMB] to prey upon BG population. You'll have fewer but large BG but your LMB will be stunted and skinny and stuck at 8-14". That's why I prefer a single sex fishery - no reproduction to worry about and no need to worry about secondary species stunting and you can still achieve a good population of 8-11" fish. A 1/3 acre pond I think could support 300 adult BG or more with pellet program and aeration. Experts can temper this advice. I have a trophy BG fishery dedicated to male BG and female YP. BG are doing very well - YP are kinda struggling. It's by far my favorite pond to manage...little efforts are immediately realized as it's a small pond, more easily managed.