Pond Boss Forums Thread Like Summary - Uninvited crappie

Y'all, we've lived here for 18 years and have a 5 acre lake. It was stocked with lmb and bluegill before we got here. We fished some, but not a lot. We'd catch some bluegill and fry them up sometimes. We have very few people who we'll allow to fish here.

A few years ago, we noticed that it was teeming with 6" to 12" lmb. They were not stunted at all. It was fun to fish, as you could be guaranteed to catch a bunch. So we started culling the lmb in that size range. About 5 years ago, we had an explosion of bluegill. There were beds all over the place, and they spawned several times over the summer.

Also around that time, I caught a black crappie. wth? We didn't stock any crappie. Then a year or 2 later, I caught 2 crappie, and my niece caught one. This year, we've still got a gazillion small to mid size lmb. Not as many bluegill nesting this year, and we're catching crappie slabs! Every crappie we catch appears to be the same size, right around 12". I haven't seen any smaller.

I'm afraid the crappie will decimate the bg population. I've read that lmb eat a lot of crappie fry. I am culling all the crappie, and the lmb. But I'm wondering now if I should leave the lmb to eat any crappie fry. We get hundreds of geese, ducks, herons, and various other water birds. Even an occasional otter. Is that how we got crappie? I can't think of any other way, but ai says that is highly unlikely.

fishwife, are you certain that they are Black Crappie? Probably best to be sure what you have, but it may not make any difference in developing a plan.

Old wisdom here at Pond Boss would state not to have Crappie in a pond less than (10) acres, but over the decades we've heard all kinds of success stories and sad stories. Of course, you're saying you don't know how they got there, and that is academic at this point. In my main (4.5) acre pond, we didn't even know we had Black Crappie for many years.

If you have some funds to spend, an electro-shock survey would help develop a multi-species plan for culling and stocking.

Early in the spring is a great time to cull crappie as they hang out around structure, and you can repeatedly catch one after another.

If all sizes of fish are fat and healthy then you are likely near balance. That is an accomplishment given the multi species present as per Sunil's comments. If the crappie look fat and healthy at all sizes, then that also indicates balance. Feeding may be a good option. Sounds like the BG are being over harvested by the LMB and crappie. I would keep doing a limited harvest of small crappie and small LMB until you get ES survey results. I would not harvest any BG at this point.

You've got a lot going on in the pond, so not all courses of action will support each goal you have. If you want bigger LMB, then you still want to cull smaller LMB. However, leaving smaller LMB in the pond may help eliminate some young crappie, thus maybe helping reduce the crappie population. In this example alone, one action ignores one goal while supporting another.

Crappie also tend to become too big to be eaten by LMB due to body shape. So, smaller LMB could put a dent in newly born crappie; however, crappie are know to have inconsistent spawns from year to year. One year may recruit a lot of crappie while the next year, recruitment is low. It seems like you're seeing this in your pond. So, leaving smaller LMB in the pond to address a situation that may not happen each year may not give the results you hope to see.

Crappie also compete with LMB for forage, so that's an overall consideration.

For me, I like having diversity in my pond, so this might be an approach to take:

1) Cull all crappie caught, unless you catch an unusually large specimen.
2) Cull all LMB under 12 or 14"; if you catch a LMB under 14" that is unusually fat, maybe leave that one in the pond.
3) Consider a feeding program if you don't already have one in place; this will increase the size of the existing LMB in the pond, and those 'larger' LMB may have a stronger impact on the crappie population.
4) Consider adding a limited amount of larger predator fish (Northern Pike, Tiger Muskie, or maybe Blue Catfish).
5) Determine if you've got White or Black Crappie. There may be some difference in management approach depending on which you have.

We culled about 150 to 200 lbs of lmb a couple years ago. Unfortunately, we didn't fish at all last year. The pictures are from my neighbor who came here one day and caught for a fish fry he was having. So far, I've been fishing most days. Yesterday, for example, I caught 10 lmb and 2 crappie. That's about the ratio we're getting. The crappie are only located in a particular area of the pond, around a pile of concrete that was dumped in when the pond was made years ago. The water there is around 12 to 14 feet, and seems to be where the crappie stay.