You guys are giving me a sick feeling that I received poor stockers. I don't want to take away from the initial topic, but any guidance on what route I should now take? I know some (Mike above for one) have embraced GSF, but would like other thoughts on correction. Thanks.
Here is a thread of mine on GSF invasion of my old pond. What I did was introduce some larger size BG (large enough so the larger GSF could not eat them) and in a couple years the pond turned completely around. There are GSF still in the pond but the BG dominate it completely in comparison.
100% GSF Your more northern BOW may act differently though. Seems like I have heard more problems in the north than in the south with GSF being a ongoing problem. "Here" the big problem with them comes in if they get established in a pond before a person puts his prized 2" fingerling stockers. Then the big mouth GSF promptly eats all of them and proceeds to fill the pond with nice GSF fingerlings helped by the high protein fingerlings the pondmeister just stocked. But once there is an established BG/LMB population they do not seem to be a problem at all. That is "here". Your results may vary.
Here is another important thing to remember. The GSF and hybrids thereof are very aggressive to bite a hook. On some days my BG are just as aggressive so I catch mostly BG and a GSF once in a while. But on days when the BG are more persnickety a person might think I only have GSF and HBG in my pond. The GSF genetics are just enough more aggressive at biting a hook that when fishing gets a little tougher I will catch a disproportionate number of fish with GSF genetics. Another very common occurrence in my main pond when first starting to fish an area for BG is I will immediately catch a few GSF and hybrids. Then I will start catching BG. Basically the GSF genetics are aggressive enough I "fish them out" in that immediate area then the BG step up to the plate and start biting.
My point in that previous paragraph is that just because you caught those three fish right off do not assume all your fish are those same type. They just have been the ones willing to bite a hook that particular day. I get the same results when setting minnow traps in my forage pond. I will trap GSF fingerlings 20 to one to RES (no BG in forage pond). But if I throw a cast net I will get 20 RES fingerlings to one GSF. RES do not go into baited traps as readily as GSF so by trap numbers it looks like the pond is filled with GSF but it is not. Now that I have been trapping for a couple months I get mostly RES fingerlings in the trap because most of the GSF fingerlings have been removed. GSF just go after fish food more aggressively than the RES.
So don't get overly excited thinking you might not have anything other than GSF in your pond till you do some more checking.
P.S. Larger GSF can be caught out in deeper water with BG. But if I purposely want to catch a small GSF for my wife to use as CC bait (CC LOVE small GSF) I will cast very near shore or around cover. GSF like shallow water and cover.
