I know very little about the Tilapia, but I've read they are good eating and a good forage food as well, I've never even seen one, and don't know what they require for survival or what they eat, (Please help me understand them). We are just looking for differant variaties to setup our second pond. I did know that LMB can be trained and our hatchery has a few available every spring, but didn't have any at the time that we stocked our first pond. Our first pond is in excellent condition and our real focus is on establishing alternative species on our second pond. I've read a lot about NOT stocking shiners, because they quickly become a preditor themselves, we need more input on our spiecies choices and WHAT is the best forage for these spieces. We will always feed our fish, because we really enjoy watching them, but we would like to make sure there is natural prey for all the preditors as well. I'm not opposed to netting several hundred shad ever summer to feed them, but I understand shad can't live in freezeing unrunning water, so we need an alternative forage for our walleye, especially. If we add a lot of crawdads & frogs for the smallies, and feed our Wipers, I still need something for the walleye. If shineres are the answer fine, but I have read so much negetive about putting them in a pond that it concerns me.
