My pond is a hair under 1/2 acre at .41 acres I believe. Steep banks to a flat 8' depth or so. One long side actually has a retention wall, no slope, and starts at 3-4'. River rock shores. No aquatic plants, but I've added a fair amount of habitat structures from PVC spheres to DIY bucket/pipe "bushes". Also a few piles of tree branches. Aerator with Vertex dual head diffuser centered in the pond. Pond was constructed in 2004 and I purchased summer 2017. Previous owner(s) had stocked LMB, various mix of RES/BG/HBG, about 5 White Amur, and we've pulled out an occasional YP. I believe it was given a pretty steady stocking of GSH and FHM that were kept up on pretty well. I also hand feed Optimal. I try every day but it is occasionally a few times a week. Northeast Ohio Location.

Ok, with that out of the way, I want to stock some HSB. On the local hatchery's website, for HSB they state "50 fish per acre stocking rate recommended". At face value that would mean about 25 for me, but I doubt that takes into consideration current stock and details. They offer 3-4", 5-7", 8-10", and 12"+.

The question - How many HSB should I get and what combination of sizes?

You are right about being coincerned with yout current stoicking numbers. This is very difficult to figure out without a shock survey. Did the previous owners manage the populations with a high level of attention? The pond is old enough to have established its populations at or near its carrying capacity unless strickly managed. If I were in such an unknown situation, I would conside removing as many pounds of fish as I was planning to put in...maybe alot more when considering HSB...when fed well, they grow fast. A pound a year or more for the first few years.

You don't want the newly stocked fish to be snacks. How big are the current LMB residents? 8 to 10 inches may be expensive snacks if you have some larger LMB in there.

I think that's good advise from QA.. Match pounds and size both. Problem I see is you really don't know your predator to prey ratio for sure. Most ponds tend to go predator heavy without management-initially-then a swing begins to go back to other panfish types but I don't think it sounds like you're at that stage. I would remove LMB 2-4" smaller in length than you plan to stock HSB.
It is really hard to make an assumption without data so be ready to evaluate and control changes as they become apparent.

The only one stocking time/list I am aware of is from 2014. I do not know what or how the pond was managed prior too, and I believe the 2014 owner just stocked & regularly supplied minnows & shiners to support good fishing. However, when I took ownership in 2017, I didn't have much luck bass fishing. I also realized the pond was pretty much a large bowl with no structure or cover which is why I started adding in either 18 or 19.

My kids were always able to pull out panfish pretty easily. A friend would occasional get some bass that I considered juvenile or mid-size. I struggled to catch many if any bass in most of 18 & 19 and finally last summer I landed what I considered to be a quite large LMB. Funny thing was I had a tiny hook on an ultralight with the kids trying to catch bluegill when he grabbed it, go figure. Early this spring was my best day where I was able to pull in 3 or 4 in a few hours. Again small/mid. So, the thought was adding the HSB could make it much more fun.

When I hand feed I get a pretty good busy response, but do not feel like the pond is loaded with fish to be at "capacity" (uneducated opinion). I've not managed numbers but do have a regular Heron grabbing a meal. In the past 3 years I've had a couple large fish wash up or end up in the yard one way or another.

Below are pictures of the early spring 2020 catches to give you an idea of size. The last picture is of the big one last year.

Bringing this back from last year.. still interested in the HSB. Curious if anyone else has input? Here is the stocking I'm aware of. I do not know what happened between '04 to '15. I've been hand-feeding Optimal a few to several days a week based on weather & schedule for two years now.

2015
37 12”+ Largemouth Bass (Unsure if 37 fish or pounds. Pounds would be about 30 fish I was told)
150 Bluegill
100 Hybrid Bluegill
75 Yellow Perch
4 White Amur (Observed 8 in spring 2020)

2020
100 Bluegill


Jones Fish currently has 5-7" HSB available.

I’m no expert but if it were me I would get the 10-12 inch HSB to be sure that I wasn’t taking a chance on my new fish becoming a snack. That’s just my 2 cents.

I hear ya, but the bigger guys are sold out. Not sure if they'll get more.

Since there is no real good detailed idea of what fish remain in the pond, the number of HSB to stock is a big guessing game. I definitely would not start with 50 per ac in an existing pond. The fish farm is in the business to sell fish and get a profit.

I think we can assume that the LMB have successfully spawned at least 3 times since 2017. Lack of the frequency of you catching numerous LMB was/is probably due to the previous owner creating hook smart bass or maybe allowing too many bass to be harvested since he was selling the property or maybe or likely some of both reasons.

If it was my pond I would spend some serious time (3-8 hrs) trying to specifically fish for small to medium size panfish using a #10 or #8 long shank hook(aka Carlisle) with small piece of worm under a slender bobber that is fished within 5ft to 20 ft of shore. Sit down vs strand while fishing so lots of fish will usually come close to shore. I can usually catch close to 20-40 fish per hour with this method. Measure length, identify, and write down EVERY fish caught. With this method in a "normal" balanced pond you will catch close to 20 panfish for every predator usually it will be a LMB any size; other predator species also count. More that 20:1 "often" means not enough predation and more bass are needed. Fewer than 20 panfish to every bass indicates a trend toward a bass heavy population. I have seen as low as 8 BG per each bass. With this method the size of each of the panfish caught can also tell a lot about the fishery. Measurement of each fish caught is a very important point. The more total fish that you catch using this method the more accurate it becomes to evaluate the fishery community. I prefer to see 200-400 fish caught before I form an good realistic opinion about the balance of fish.

Another simple option is remove 1 bass for every HSB that is added. Allow them to grow one year then re-evaluate the overall panfish predator ratio. the size and number of panfish can be skewed by the number and size of predators that are allowed to be present. You may also need to restock some LMB and make sure they are pellet trained if you do add LMB.

I'd be leery of stocking more than ten HSB per acre in an established pond. Started with 70 in my 8 acre BOW, gauged how they were doing, then added 25 two years later. But I'd bet fewer than 80 still alive.