Pond Boss Forums STOCKING A NEW POND Creating the food chain Adding crayfish to the pond

Bill,

When I was a kid, my grandpa would task me with collecting crayfish for the next day or so fishing trip for YP. He preferred soft shelled (recently molted), but was not fussy.

The place I went to was Sand Creek, about 1/4 mile from home. The bridge was rebuilt over the creek in previous years and a lot of the concrete chunks from the bridge, kinda fell in the water. OOPS!

Anyway, it was a hot spot for collecting crayfish. Some say Cray, some say Craw. Grandpa was thrilled with what I collected. Not a clue as to what species tho, but this was in the late 60's to early 70's.

Buzzed down to the creek under the bridge about 18 years ago. Bridge was rebuilt again, but the the same chunks of concrete seemed to be in place. You never forget those things. Collected a few crays, and they were all Rusties. I put some in a tank with rock as structure and tossed dead minnows to them. Did fine, but quite illegal now.

Supposedly good for a crayfish boil tho. State want's you to eat them.

Bill D, you might remember me telling my story of my grandson and I catching hundreds of crawfish in the bogs on my land and then moving these baby craws to the pond. I watched these crawfish grow in size and many were (I believe eaten). These crawfish turned out to be Red Swamps and are found all over this area (most likely due to crawfish farmers here). in my research I discovered these are abundant in the USA and are found in southern Illinois. I also read they will overtake a native species.. My point is, if the red swamps are in your area, then I would not expect the papershells to last for very long. I may be wrong as it would not be the first time for me.

Tracy