Pond Boss Forums INTRO Questions & Observations Sustainable Forage...fatheads?

Thanks Theo. That's entirely appropriate. I'll be interested to read others comments on my views of a positive cumulative effect of Tilapia on algae control, increased BG populations, sustainability of excellent LMB relative weights, and last but not least, an optimal declining stocking rate as a function of time for Tilapia. I'm sure my guess at 2 to 3 pounds per acre isn't the right number, but you have to start somewhere. It may take several "experiments" to find that optimal rate.

I haven't ordered anything yet, I was going to wait till it cooled down to do so but from what I'm gathering here it may be best to put the whole thing off until next spring. As for the milfoil and GC, I've read that they will eat it but they'll graze any alternative before hitting it. I also found some info that suggested my stocking rate of 6-8 per acre. If that is not the consensus here I'll think twice. I always side with results from practice instead of theory.

What about areation for my weed issues?

I'll be posting some pics in a few minutes.

Shorty -- any thoughts as to why the GC aren't effective on coontail and milfoil?? Others in your area have the same experience?? Thanks.

Dave - I think milfoil and coontail are just low on the preference list of plants GC like to eat. The milfoil also seems to start growing well when the water temps are still fairly cold and the milfoil grows faster than the GC can keep up with it early in the spring. I suspect the GC's metablosim is still fairly low when the milfoil is starting to grow strong. It could also be that we simply do not have enough GC stocked in the pond to make a noticable difference in the weeds. We have roughly 6-7 GC per acre in the 2-3 year old range right now, we also have some very old and big GC leftover from when they were stocked in the late 1980's.

There are not very many other paces around here with milfoil in it so it is hard to compare with other ponds. The new NE farm pond book from our G & P does not reccomend GC for controlling milfoil, coontail, duckweed, and FA. They also point out that GC also generate a lot of fetrilizer for new weed growth as a result of their heavy grazing activities.

One of the things that exaserbates the problem in our pond is the water clarity, the clearer the water gets, the deeper the weeds tend to grow up from the bottom. Back in May our sechi disk readings were 108". I am seriously considering going with a high density stocking of channel catfish in attempt to keep the water clarity down and therefore the weed growth down. I am thinking this might work better than adding more GC.

BTW - I did have a close encounter with one of the GC we origianlly stocked in the late 1980's this last Saturday. This GC was sticking it's tail out of the water while feeding near my boat, the span on just the tail was 13-14" wide.

That's not one you want jumping over the net and into your face while seining.

One other thing I should mention is that milfoil is very suspectable to the chemical Navigate, much more susceptable than cootail. We have had very effective milfoil kills without ever using the full recommeded application rate.

One thing KC needs to look out for is the sudden disappearence of most of the weeds, this will throw the established predator prey balance out of whack very quickly. High densities of LMB will become very effective predators and out eat their small BG food source in a very short time if their numbers are not thinned down. I have seen this happen more than once in our pond, trust me, lots of skinny big headed LMB are depressing to catch. As general rule of thumb, the harder the weeds get knocked down then the more pressure one needs to put on the harvest of LMB.

Shorty,

We have a variety of weeds and several acres of shallows, 2 ft and less for hatcheries/nurseries.

Here are pics from our weekend:

Jared and I caught these bass out of a canoe from around the lake over the course of a half hour to 45 minutes. There were only a few bass caught above the slot and they were skinny, I'll post an example further down the thread:



Jared was a big fan of a tiny beetle spin and I was rolling with the smallest grub in my box:


While I was cleaning fish my 'help' did this with a bass intestine:


The next morning before breakfast we found a thief... If he does this to rats though he can have a few eggs on the side. I know its OT but I thought it was an interesting pic:


My buddy Trey with a typical bass out of the slot. 16 inches or so but skinny. Only three years ago I was pulling out 3-1/2 to 4lb fish with regularity:


I read the links concerning golden shiners and folks seemed to shy away from them. Can anyone elaborate on the reasons to avoid them? Thanks.

KC Ml might tell you less than this along with others but for small ponds I like at least 15/acre if you lose 3 it makes a major impact. However if you lose 3 when stocking 50 in 5 acre not as big a deal, a numbers thing. SO my rec. are on a case by case basis but in genral 1/4 acre 5, 1/2 acre 8, 1 acre 12, 2 acres 18, 5 acres 40 and 10 acres 60 with soemthing like millfoil.

The other major diff is stocking size many times numbers are based on 8-10 inch and as mentioned wil be gone in a few days with minimal survivial by stocking bigger ones we are able to reduce stocking rates to ones mentioned above.

DW, many of the native grasses are easily crushed by the grass carp pharg. teeth. However with coontail and milfoil not as easy to consume, so they eat the steak first and then work their way down to the bologna sandwich.

KC, a lot of my recent comments about Golden Shiners have been more in jest.

For the past few years, I've been putting hundreds of pounds of Golden Shiners into my pond. There were existing populations of SMB, LMB, Black Crappie, Bluegill, Bullheads, Yellow Perch, and some other assorted fish, so I wanted to make sure I was adding enough to take hold. I was also having a lot of basic pond weed, so the Golden Shiners had good cover.

This year, when I throw out some feed, I'll see several hundreds of Golden Shiners; it's like a constant flurry of micro-boils on the water, and these Golden Shiners were 3-4" long.

I also feel that I've lost a lot of LMB and SMB over the past 2 years. I believe this is due to poaching, and this has helped the Golden Shiners take hold.

When I first discovered the amount of Golden Shiners that I had in residence, I had over a hundred pounds of Golden Shiners scheduled to be delivered the following week.

The following weeks shipment of Golden Shiners did happen, however, the fish guy had massive mortalities, and maybe less than a thousand lived.

I will continue to use them in the future, but only after trying to assess the current populations.

Basically, I'm pro-Golden Shiner.

KC, you may have noted I've been one of the most vocal about not wanting GSH. But that is solely due to the fact that I wish to raise big BG & RES in my pond and do not want 1) GSH taking up biomass and 2) LMB filling up on GSH instead of thinning my BG.

I think GSH are great forage for LMB, especially in the Northern half of the country where some of the forage options that work well in the Southern tier of states aren't as attractive (TSF, for example). If I had decided I wanted to concentrate on big bass, I would currently be bemoaning the drop in my GSH numbers and trying to figure what plants/structure I needed to add to save them.

Completely understand. I like to have balance with good bass fishing. I was catching nice bluegill all weekend right along with the bass. Perhaps I should just harvest the hell out of the 8-13 inch bass and get a few grass carp to open the water up.

On milfoil: