Pond Boss Forums Thread Like Summary - Stocking help

Hi,

I live in southern Indiana. I have a 1.65 acre pond. It has steep slopes the depth down the middle from one end of the pond to the other is 24 feet. It is half full. No fish. I love fishing. I want to be able to get a good system together. I would love yellow perch, smallmouth, redear, catfish, and because of the depth put and take rainbow. I don’t even know if this is all possible or feasible. I will regularly take out the channel cats. Basically I don’t want fish I can go catch on every other pond in a 2 mile area. I want to know where to start how to stock etc. I know it’s a tall order but I have read a lot on this forum and others. Hopefully someone can get me going on when to add forage fish, stocking rates, and if this combination would even work. Thank you in advance.

Smalllunker,
Follow the advice I was given and get your forage species started now. If you have the patience wait a year then add your predators. If not stock a large amount of forage to get a head start(more $). Get your pallets and FHM in yesterday (decide whether or not you want Golden Shiners, I did) let the FHM spawn all summer. Make sure you get your FHM from a reliable source. I used Anderson’s Minnow Farm. You do not want BG or GSF mixed in with your cool water species plan. YP and RES can be stocked this fall (Oct-Dec). Buy feed trained YP to take the pressure off your forage. If you don’t live at your pond purchase a fish feeder (Mine is a Texas Hunter Feeder and I love it) before you get the feed trained fish. Use any fish feed (Tractor Supply) for your forage fish and fish feed that’s 40%+ protein for your YP,SMB and RBT. I use Optimal others use Purina. If you want to add crayfish wait until your ready to put in the SMB and CC in fall 2022. It’s great to have a forage pond(s) as well. Find alternative forage species such as bluntnose minnows, grass shrimp, Spotfin shiners and others that are native to your area that will spawn in ponds. Don’t add the trout until the other fish have been stocked. If you haven’t heard of Hybrid Striped Bass (HSB) I would recommend looking at those as well. I have a 2 year old cool species pond myself and the information I have provided is a brief summary of some of the things that I’ve learned. If anything I stated is incorrect please feel free to correct me. As for stocking numbers I will leave that to the experts.

What Heppy said. Rainbow do really well in a pond environment, especially if you feed them. I enjoy them in the Texas winter! Even in Indiana, though, they will be put & take due to summer temps usually exceeding what they can survive.

Hybrid stripers are another interesting idea. Great fighters, though they don't jump.

If you really want to go exotic, could even consider one or two tiger musky. But they will eat your other fish, even pretty large ones.