Pond Boss Forums INTRO Questions & Observations What makes exceptional trophy lakes different?

I think 2nd year could be too early to get the benefit of forage growth and maybe not required at this stage. Remember that 4" RBT are going to very vulnerable to >18" but that they will quickly grow out of the high vulnerability window in a month or two. By the time they reach 6" in length, they will be more difficult to consume and so will be much less frequently on the menu. So one way around this, if you were to supplement trout, is to stock smaller numbers of RBT periodically. The downside is that you will not get the full benefit of growth which will cheapen the cost of forage. The amount stocked should be the amount that could reasonably be consumed by the time they grow to 25% the length of your LMB. 4" to 5" RBT fall within the window for 20" LMB and beyond that length the frequency of consumption will fall off rapidly. So by stocking cohorts of smaller fish where they are consumed while at optimum lengths one can keep them growing optimum. IMHO, RBT forage should be reserved for when ponds have fish exceeding 20" that are otherwise not getting enough BG forage because there is not enough BG YOY survival growing into their optimum consumption window. For large LMB, this window may not be achieved for a BG until the year after hatching.

Check out the plan for my dream pond where I would like to grow a few trophy LMB. First, this is where I would like for the pond to be in 10 years. The initial stocking will be 32 female LMB (8 per acre). Each year I will select 1 fish for trophy track and harvest up to 7 LMB and stock 8 Female LMB. Selected fish will be the ones that are most vulnerable to fishing. I would like for the trophy fish to possess behavior that makes them easier to catch. Now, I will mention that the standing weight is somewhat small and this because I do not intend to stock BG. At this point I would like to stock RES and supplement TP YOY with a forage pond. A fair proportion of the forage for the LMB will be supplied by RES where I fill in the holes with supplemental forage or by feeding previously raised TP morts I have frozen. I will also probably try to encourage a base population of crayfish in my pond with just enough cover to provide for overwinter survival of say 20 to 40 lbs of crayfish/acre. The plan depicts per acre data for a 5 acre pond.



Notice the length increments that I anticipate will be attained where the LMB are growing maximally for my location. I came up with the numbers by estimating length at 110 RW and 1 lb/year growth. This is as much as I expect them to grow in length. After locking in those lengths, I adjusted the weight gain annually until the RW for later years approaches RW 135. This is as fat as I expect they can get. The forage requirements in LBs/year are what are required to attain the next years growth increment. You may notice that after 4 years the harvest is restricted to >20" LMB. By the time LMB reach 20", they are beginning to require forage > 1 year of age. Its more difficult to produce this forage in sufficient quantity and so I plan to have fewer LMB >20" than <20" where I would like to (if possible) to grow a few examples of Northern LMB >10 lbs in a Northern OK pond. This is a modest standing weight and plan that requires the production of forage energy equivalent of 180 lbs of RES per acre year. Fish <20" require 131 lbs forage per acre-year while fish >20" require 48 lbs of forage per acre year.



So the plan is to supplement with TP grown in a 1/20 acre forage pond grown to 2" to 2.5" in length or to stock adult TP. If the forage is grown in a forage pond, then I will need at least 3 lbs of females. If growing in the pond with RES and LMB, I am not sure just how much weight of females I would need (probably >15 lbs). It would depend on survival of the hatches to 2" to 2.5" sizes. It is unclear what survival to the 2.25" lengths would be in the fishing pond. Below is an example of a TP cohort of 1100 TP/acre (2.25" avg length totaling 15 lbs/acre) stocked on June 1st with an LMB standing weight of 27.5 lbs/acre. The cohort is stocked at 40 days post fertilization and attains a maximum standing weight of 22 lbs/acre and achieves a length average of 4.33 by the 45th day after stocking. The cohort will produce ~41 lbs of consumed forage and gain the LMB standing weight by as much as 27% in weight over the 45 day period. Cohorts are optimized on a 45 day stocking schedule. The weight 45 days after stocking is ~ 11 lbs and these match the best growth I expect of RES in their 0-year. IOWs TP can provide the larger prey that >20 LMB need in their 0-year only 85 days after they were fertilized. I think I can get in 2 to 3 cohorts annually. OR I just might stock adults each year and take what they are able to produce in the pond what ever that may be (which is a much easier path to follow).