Pond Boss Forums STOCKING A NEW POND Types of fish to choose Walleye pond: How big is big enough ?

I keep reading on here that Walleye don't reproduce well in small ponds. OK, point well made, but how big of a pond does one need for good Walleye production? Or does this depend on alot of other factors besides pond size? I have an 80 acre slough that I'm considering making into primarily a Walleye pond. Is 80 acres big enough? What other factors are important to facilitate an environment condusive to Walleye reproduction?

You should't have any problem growing walleyes in your slough. BUT, Successful walleye reproduction is not a matter of pond size. Done correctly, one can hatch walleye eggs in a bucket. For walleye eggs to hatch in the natural setting, they need clear water, wind swept shorelines and highly oxygenated silt free conditions among the rocks where the eggs are laid. Rocks in the spawning areas need to be relatively clean with little attached algae growth and practically no silt in the vacinity. Periphytic grazers in nutrient rich waters eat many of the eggs. I'm convinced that igneous rocks are best. Turbid or cloudy water and settlings from sedimented conditions smother eggs or allow them to become fungused. Often in Lake Erie where clear water and lots of wave action prevail, poor hatches occur due too much wave action producing murky water on the reefs produced from north and east winds. Murky, turbid water has a big impact on egg hatch. Lots of WE eggs are laid in the Maumee and Sandusky Rivers that drain into western Lake Erie. However turbid waters that prevail in these rivers in spring result in very few successful hatches of walleye eggs. Just about all Lk Erie walleyes egg hatches occur in the lake conditions.

Best non-Great Lakes natural walleye production occurs in Canadian Shield waters or similar waters. Low nutrients and igneous, cobble rock, windswept shorelines. Walleye production of young is rare even in the reservoirs and lakes where they are stocked in areas south of Canada. Even the big US walleye states of MI, WI, MN, ND, SD, PA have walleye raising programs for supplimental stocking of many of their nonsustaining WE waters.

I live near a lake in southern minnesota that is becoming a slough. Lake elysian is fair sized in surface area but muddy, poluted, and under 15 feet deep. The minnesota DNR stocks up to 2 million fry every other year. I have heard rumors of carp netters who netted, wieghed and released a state record walleye from that lake.