Originally Posted By: Bill D.
Originally Posted By: Yolk Sac
Originally Posted By: Mitch3034
Thanks for the advice. Would you suggest putting the SMB and or HSB in this fall or wait til next year and how many of each?

When did you stock your forage species? If it was early this year, and they have had time to spawn, you could add some SMB this fall; you'll be hard pressed to find any in the spring to stock, and you'll want to have them present to control your BG as quickly as possible, once the BG start spawning.

As Bill indicated, you may have a lot of BG thinning to do to prevent BG overpopulation, at least until you have a strong number of smallies to work the BG numbers for you. You'll likely need to concentrate on the BG that make it past smallie forage size, usually in the 4-8" range; this size will really accumulate and prevent best top end growth for your other lepomids. The HSB have pretty small gape size, and won't help much on these larger, midsized BG.

You could consider adding some WE--they'll eventually get to a size where they'll help cull the BG.

Don't be discouraged about adding the BG. A half acre pond can be managed much more effectively than a larger BOW, and there are a heck of a lot worse ways you could be spending your time than fishing for BG. And if you have kids, you can put a "bounty" on the size fish you want to remove.


+1

I have a small pond (with SMB and BG) and IMO it is way easier to manage than a larger one would be. Small changes by adding to your predator base and/or removing a few by angling can make adjustments to the pond balance way easier than in a larger pond. In addition to what Yolksac said, if you think you have too much recruitment from your BG you can always add a few more SMB or WE or YP (yes they eat small BG) or .....

IMO starting with SMB and BG just means you might end up with a more diverse pond than originally planned...never know what you will catch when you toss in a line!



Need to address this post as it relates to BG population management and nudge it in the right direction. Based on my experience over the past several years and other cool water species fishery managers, predator density can serve as a BG population management tool as has been discussed, but since BG over 5" are virtually invulnerable to predation of limited gape predators, predator density/additional predator stocking is not a simple solution. The problem is that once BG attain this size they cannot be utilized as forage by SMB/YP/WE/HSB except by an exceptional fish. I'm not confident you'll be growing any 25"+ HSB or 18"+ SMB in a half acre pond, and certainly not if you have dense predator populations. Further, considering the small sized pond, one cannot simply continue to stock predator species as we're facing a limited carrying capacity in .5 acres. If one were to employ a solution only focusing on dense predator population, the BG 1-3" will be extirpated and you'll still be left with an overpopulation of BG in the 5-6" range not to mention likely low WR predators [slow growing skinny SMB, YP, HSB] as there's a lack of appropriate sized forage. This is exactly the scenario about which Cody, Yolk and I have been warning everyone. The solution to BG population management in a limited gape fishery is not predator density alone - it's an element of the solution, maybe, but it's not that easy - especially in a small pond with limited carrying capacity.

Many men go fishing all of their lives without knowing that it is not fish they are after. ~ Henry David Thoreau

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