I hope this is appropriate here since it is about feeding. I tried a search but didn't find what I am looking for.
Maybe it's just a stupid question but for those who feed and live where your pond freezes over for several months....I know the fish require much less to eat during those months but if they are used to getting food regularly, is there any effect on health/growth in those winter months? There is a push during the warm months to grow fast and bigger which means they require more to sustain through the winter months even though they are much more lethargic.
Or, am I overthinking the whole feeding thing? In my case - one acre pond, 13ft in deepest, BG, SM, LM, and Crappie.
Was your question answered to your satisfaction? I didn't see any answers pertaining to your concern. At least not to my satisfaction had I voiced the concern.
I do my best to answer your question as I understood your concern. First, it's a great question in my way of thinking.
So you've fed all growing season and the feeding you have done have both grown and maintained a higher standing weight than the pond's natural fertility could maintain and support. In the fall, you cut off the feed in prep for winter.
Wouldn't this greater standing weight of fish need more through winter than the pond is capable of maintaining? Yes. Yes, of course.
That is, unless the pond's standing weight is less than the pond can carry. There are two ways the pond's standing weight can be adjusted down. One is
natural mortality while the other is
harvest mortality (fishery biologist call that exploitation mortality).
Natural mortality is "usually" not enough to adjust down the standing weight to below what the pond will carry on its own. In those cases where it is, you have experienced an unwelcome event, a fish kill (excessive natural mortality). So,
harvest mortality is needed to keep the standing weight below what natural foods can support during those years when all is well with your pond.
If the harvest is performed continuously throughout the growing season. The standing weight may be fairly stable and NEVER exceed the weight the pond native fertility could maintain.
Essentially a person is harvesting the gain as the gain is produced (or more correctly, when stable, the combination of natural and harvest mortality balances with the gain). A one acre pond may gain (with sufficient feed) 6 to 8 lbs per week in standing weight. This can be removed without the standing weight being diminished. If the gain is harvested as it is grown, then all fish will grow and at the end of the season (if they are below the standing weigh that natural fertility can maintain) they will not go hungry and they will likely gain a little over winter. This is how to use feed at its most advantageous.
Without sufficient harvest, the same thing that happens to ponds that are not fed happens to ponds that are fed. The growth of most individual fish in the pond slows WAY DOWN (in balance with natural mortality).
