Pond Boss Forums INTRO New Forum Member Introduction Advice for a new(ish) northern pond

I will assume you are not going to feed the fish pellets nor buy pellet trained fish??? This does make a big difference in how many to stock and how many the pond can grow. How do you plan to get the perch? Hook and line or fish farm?

If you catch them yourself fewer numbers can be stocked due to the angling time, availability, and live transport difficulty of moving and oxygenating large numbers of larger perch. Timing of stocking also plays a role in how many you stock. Using pre-spawn YP as opposed to post-spawn will make a difference.

I would not add any smallmouth until the perch produce at least one spawn. You don't want the SMB to be eating most of the minnows taking them away from the perch for growth. Ideally you want the SMB to eat small perch and sunfish not mostly minnows. However the SMB do not read the "book" of want they are supposed to eat. I would be picky as to the size SMB you stock and initially only put in those in the 4"-8" sizes that you catch with small baits. Also until there are numerous small perch available I would only put in 3-5 smaller sized SMB. If possible you could 'sight fish' these small bass by searching for them visually along shore and then present a baited hook near them. These few small bass can eat a lot of small fish very likely each can eat 200-300 small fish per year. Bass are much easier to add than remove.