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 Originally Posted By: Brettski
 Originally Posted By: jignpig
and even though it might be hard to explain things completely sometimes, i'll try to be a little more brief and to the point in my posts if that's what y'all really want.

good news and bad news...
-
good news: we're back on track with JnP Hawg report
bad news: he is considering changin' his info delivery method to conform to a presumed forum need. WRONGO! jignpig...you stay right where you started; in your comfort zone. Period.
-
-
thanx, man


Well said Brettski. I second the motion!


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3/4 to 1 1/4 ac pond LMB, SMB, PS, BG, RES, CC, YP, Bardello BG, (RBT & Blue Tilapia - seasonal).
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BlackBass, if you are interested in the floy tags, I suggest you contact Greg Grimes here and do some price shopping. You'll probably be surprised. I bought a gun and 100 numbered tags from Greg last year. I still have to catch a tagged fish, but I've never found one dead yet either....


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take just a minute to reflect on your retirement plan and its various options. what's a good strategy to maximize growth? doesn't it make sense to allocate as much of your resources as possible to your consistent, long-term "performers" to maximize your gains? what about the funds that have been consistent underachievers for you? don't you eventually decide to to cut your losses to rid yourself of a non-performer fund? after all, it's a win-win. first, you get rid of dead weight that's doing nothing but slowing you down and keeping you from reaching your goals. second, you are able to use those newly freed up resources to invest even more into the "blue chippers". and how do you distinguish the funds and investments that are performing for you from those that aren't? you study the quarterly reports to learn how your investments are doing over both the short and long term.

this has been my approach to raising lunkers. when i started pond management, i got numbers down to where i thought they should be through my best efforts at a "smart" selective harvest - indiscriminantly getting rid of all the runts i could, and then getting rid of all the males i could during the spawn (when it is relatively easy to identify and catch males.) i then set out on a program to grow and easily identify the "blue chip" bass in the pond. every bass had something to prove, and its future in the pond depended on it.

this is where my journal came into play. i wanted to do two things - come up with a system to accurately identify my bass, a "who's who" of the pond so to speak. after identification, i wanted to track growth rates to identify the fish that were growing the fastest, and therefore in my mind showed the most potential.

the identification part wasn't really difficult. i said earlier that i had stocked the pond with "wild" fish that i had caught at other locations, mostly fish in the 2 pound range. to be a candidate for the pond, the bass had to appear relatively young and healthy. when it was possible, i tried to use bass that had some sort of distinctive marking to make future identification easy. you will be suprised at how many of your own bass (and other fish species as well) have at least one distinctive mark if you examine them closely. for example here's my little fishing buddy proudly holding up one of my younger project fish she caught. notice the light colored pigment blotch on its back, right behind the top part of its gill plate and right below where its dorsal fin is just beginning.



now if you don't have a bass with distinctive markings, don't despair. you see each largemouth has its own "bar code" in the series of dark spots and blotches that form the line down it's side. like snowflakes, no two are ever the same. prior to releasing a fish into the pond i always took at least one picture of the bass, a close up of the fish's entire side. i always used the same side of the fish for obvious reasons. you want to compare left sides to left sides. if the fish had a distinctive marking, i took a picture of that as well. for those who don't want to try to identify fish through their natural markings, i have heard of using various fin clippings and tags to make i.d. a breeze. but i never wanted to fool with the tags, and i didn't want to injure my fish unnecessarily. in cases where the bass' "bar code" was dull or indistinct due to various water conditions, i had a little trick. i kept a large 35 gal. storage bin in the back of my truck full of clear water. i only had to let the fish swim around in the clear water for a few seconds before its unique individual pattern popped out vividly. if you look at some of my fish pics, you will see how "pretty" and vivid most of my fish look with their spots and colors popping. the clear water in the bin is usually the reason.

each fish got its own "chapter" in my notebook starting with it's pictures. as a whole, the notebook represented an inventory of most of the bass in the pond, and all of the ones that mattered to me. these were what i called my "project fish". every time i caught a fish from the pond that was not identifiable as a project fish, i removed it unless it appeared to have some potential. in the extremely rare case that it did show potential (very few of the original bass in the pond were up to par) i took pictures and it too became part of the project inventory. from there, i gave each fish a name to simplify identification. i kept a series of statistics on each project fish. the most important of these were the date i originally released the fish into the pond, its weight upon initial introduction into the pond, subsequent catch dates, weight at each catch, and whether the fish appeared to be "soft bellied" (empty stomach) or "hard bellied" (full stomach) at each catch. please note that i wanted to make sure i was giving each fish a fair shake as i considered its potential. i did not want to compare a pre-spawn weight one year to a post-spawn weight the next. i did not want to compare a fish with a full stomach one year to that same fish with an empty belly the next. we all know that even a relatively small bass can gain 6 oz. of body weight in one feeding binge. i wanted to make sure i was always comparing apples to apples. each time i caught a project fish, i was extremely careful with it making every effort to keep it safe and avoid injury.

i probably don't have to tell you the rest of the story. i was absolutely amazed at how quickly i got to know my fish and could recognize them both in and out of the water by their appearance, and if you can believe it, their own unique mannerisms and habits. some were always shy. some were always naturally curious. some were consistently aggressive. before i knew it, i didn't even need the pictures to immediately identify each fish. soon, i didn't even really need the journal to be honest, even though keeping it made things more exact. using the story each fish told me about its potential through the statistics i recorded, i was able to easily identify the "blue chippers" - the fastest growing fish. i even sorted the fish into tiers, based on their potential. i tried to make sure that all my project fish were generously fed as long as they were showing acceptable growth. but i ALWAYS made sure sure that MAXIMUM food resources were allocated to top tier fish to squeeze every ounce of growth out of them that i possibly could.

that little journal forced me to do something very, very important - become familiar with my fish. to this day, i believe that is a vital ingredient in managing for trophies in a small pond. i was able to raise big fish because i was able to recognize the star performers and accurately evaluate potential. i could compare growth rates. i knew which fish to keep around and allocate resources to. i knew when a fish was an underachiever and needed to leave the pond to free up resources for the overachievers. to me, star quality in a fish is not determined by how big it is, unless it is huge already. a fish's star quality is determined by how fast they are getting big, in other words, their growth rate. at least that's the way i see it. right now, there are 3 pound fish in the pond that i value more highly than some of the 4's. why? because they are growing faster. they are getting every single ounce of growth possible out of each growing season. soon these young butterballs will surpass their older counterparts. in time they'll become the tales that my daughter and i tell with big smiles on our faces, and the pictures that have my friends drooling. and it's in those moments that i can't help but fondly recall how it all started with a dream, a few goals, and a notebook.

well, i made it through this without the beeper going off. unbelievable. might be a quiet night. really didn't think i'd get to finish this until next week. hope this helps someone in some small way. i told ya it was micromanagement to the highest degree, but it worked for me beyond anything i ever imagained and became very simple after only a short while. hopefully it will work for some of y'all too.


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Jignpig: Interesting read, which brings me to these questions (if you dont mind). You mentioned that you always did your best to give maximum allocation of food resourses to your top achievers. 1.) How do you know what food they wanted the most? (ie. flushing the stomach contents, or?) 2.) Have you found a way to "know" what size food a certain size fish wants to quickly achieve max size or are you taking a SWAG(sophisticated wild a*s guess)? Thanks, Don.

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I have just found the answer to one of my question each fish identification. In my little pond this is something I really need to do. I have a limited space and need to keep the best fish and know how many I have. This form is a life line for guys like me that are working and trying to manage a little family pond. GnP thanks for your input and to all who have helped this old man. Ain’t got time but to do it right the first time.
Please forgive me if I ask the same questions two or three time.


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"i said earlier that i had stocked the pond with "wild" fish that i had caught at other locations, mostly fish in the 2 pound range."

Hey Jig,
Question about above quote. I have been told and read time and time again that this is a big no,no. Is this part of your thinking out of the management box? I actually was going to do this myself as I belive most of my bass are stunted from several years of non management but was told and read not to do this as it can lead to bad results? But it looks like you did fine with it? Your thoughts?


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Is JnP available to manage my retirement funds?

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Editor, Pond Boss Magazine
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This stuff is meat, I'm telling you.


Teach a man to grow fish...
He can teach to catch fish...
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Excellent read. Tell us more.


It's true hard work never killed anybody, but I figure, why take the chance?
Ronald Reagan
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I had a feeling this was part of the path I could not walk down. Extreme fine tuning with highest potential fish by selective harvesting. I just have too many fish, way too many individuals to track consistent. And no way am I ever tagging. Thanks for coming back and writing in your own style. I thoroughly enjoy your posts. And when you said in some ways my management style and goals are more difficult than yours, I respectfully disagree. I can half ass it and get away with good results. You are just downright perfectionist. The results speak for themselves. Good for you jig and pig. I'll tell you one thing, I am starting ponds where I will be able to use some of your methods. Thanks for all of the tips. Your input to this forum is invaluable, especially to a multiple pond guy like me.

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for the sake of continuity, i am taking the first part of the post and attaching it to the second. i am not really sure if this is even the section this belongs in. maybe it should go under managing an existing pond. if i have misplaced it, i apologize. anyway, i got to thinking about it and thought it might make more sense this way. mods, bob, delete the other two posts if you wanna. i tried and i couldn't. sorry. hope i'm not making a mess here. i'll try to answer a few questions as i can throughout the day.

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back when i got serious about management, as i've already detailed, i started a journal. i've already covered how i started the journal with my goals, objectives, and dreams, so i won't belabor those points. but i told ya that this little notebook also served a very important second purpose. it was my "crystal ball" with which i could accurately predict which bass in the pond were destined for greatness. that's what i hope to cover here. but a word of caution before you read any further. if you are dealing with big ponds, if you are not really serious about raising lunkers, or if you do not want to invest a little (and by a little, i mean VERY little) more time than usual in your management process, stop reading here. what i'm about to say will be impractical for you.

we all know that when it comes to raising monster bass in small ponds, selective harvest is a must. sadly, most folks don't seem to pay too much attention to proper selective harvest for the purpose of raising trophies, even when they THINK they're doing a great job with it. yes, they are dilligent. and yes they harvest in correct proportions. but unfortunately sometimes they are shooting themselves in the foot by removing the WRONG BASS. unknowingly, sometimes pond managers fire their franchise players! to make it worse, they keep sub-par performers on the team. i'll illustrate on a small scale to make things a little more simplistic.

one day joe goes fishing at his pond. he's been at this pond management thing a while and has now decided he wants some lunkers in his water. joe realizes he needs to take a fish or 2 out every so often to make his goals a reality. so on this particular outing, joe catches 2 healthy fish, a 3 pounder and a 4 pounder. well, this is a no brainer for joe. he quickly releases the 4 with dreams that this fish will one day be a jaw-dropper. without a second thought, he harvests the 3 to accompany some slaw and hush puppies. he goes back to to the house patting himself on the back for a successful "selective harvest" thinking he's right on track.

here's the problem. what joe didn't realize was that the fish he released was a male fish that had basically topped out in growth. over the past year, that fish had only shown a net gain of 3 ounces. the one he kept for supper was a little female destined for greatness until her progress was permanantly brought to a screeching halt that day. prior to being caught, that fish had doubled her body weight from the previous year. her growth rate was fast, and the sky was the limit. like a snowball rolling downhill, she was gaining even more momentum with each passing month. she was one of joe's "star players". of course the key word here is "was" because now she's swimming in the fry daddy instead of joe's pond.

poor joe. but we can't fault him though, can we? he was just doing what seemed right. there's no way he could have known that he had released a fish back into his pond that would never be any bigger than 4.75 pounds. there's no way he could have imagined that the one in his belly would have grown to 11.5 had she been allowed to live out her days. he couldn't possibly guess all that from a short fishing trip. or could he?

as you consider that question, take just a minute to reflect on your retirement plan and its various options. what's a good strategy to maximize growth? doesn't it make sense to allocate as much of your resources as possible to your consistent, long-term "performers" to maximize your gains? what about the funds that have been consistent underachievers for you? don't you eventually decide to to cut your losses to rid yourself of a non-performer fund? after all, it's a win-win. first, you get rid of dead weight that's doing nothing but slowing you down and keeping you from reaching your goals. second, you are able to use those newly freed up resources to invest even more into the "blue chippers". and how do you distinguish the funds and investments that are performing for you from those that aren't? you study the quarterly reports to learn how your investments are doing over both the short and long term.

this has been my approach to raising lunkers. when i started pond management, i got numbers down to where i thought they should be through my best efforts at a "smart" selective harvest - indiscriminantly getting rid of all the runts i could, and then getting rid of all the males i could during the spawn (when it is relatively easy to identify and catch males.) i then set out on a program to grow and easily identify the "blue chip" bass in the pond. every bass had something to prove, and its future in the pond depended on it.

this is where my journal came into play. i wanted to do two things - come up with a system to accurately identify my bass, a "who's who" of the pond so to speak. after identification, i wanted to track growth rates to identify the fish that were growing the fastest, and therefore in my mind showed the most potential.

the identification part wasn't really difficult. i said earlier that i had stocked the pond with "wild" fish that i had caught at other locations, mostly fish in the 2 pound range. to be a candidate for the pond, the bass had to appear relatively young and healthy. when it was possible, i tried to use bass that had some sort of distinctive marking to make future identification easy. you will be suprised at how many of your own bass (and other fish species as well) have at least one distinctive mark if you examine them closely. for example here's my little fishing buddy proudly holding up one of my younger project fish she caught. notice the light colored pigment blotch on its back, right behind the top part of its gill plate and right below where its dorsal fin is just beginning.



now if you don't have a bass with distinctive markings, don't despair. you see each largemouth has its own "bar code" in the series of dark spots and blotches that form the line down it's side. like snowflakes, no two are ever the same. prior to releasing a fish into the pond i always took at least one picture of the bass, a close up of the fish's entire side. i always used the same side of the fish for obvious reasons. you want to compare left sides to left sides. if the fish had a distinctive marking, i took a picture of that as well. for those who don't want to try to identify fish through their natural markings, i have heard of using various fin clippings and tags to make i.d. a breeze. but i never wanted to fool with the tags, and i didn't want to injure my fish unnecessarily. in cases where the bass' "bar code" was dull or indistinct due to various water conditions, i had a little trick. i kept a large 35 gal. storage bin in the back of my truck full of clear water. i only had to let the fish swim around in the clear water for a few seconds before its unique individual pattern popped out vividly. if you look at some of my fish pics, you will see how "pretty" and vivid most of my fish look with their spots and colors popping. the clear water in the bin is usually the reason.

each fish got its own "chapter" in my notebook starting with it's pictures. as a whole, the notebook represented an inventory of most of the bass in the pond, and all of the ones that mattered to me. these were what i called my "project fish". every time i caught a fish from the pond that was not identifiable as a project fish, i removed it unless it appeared to have some potential. in the extremely rare case that it did show potential (very few of the original bass in the pond were up to par) i took pictures and it too became part of the project inventory. from there, i gave each fish a name to simplify identification. i kept a series of statistics on each project fish. the most important of these were the date i originally released the fish into the pond, its weight upon initial introduction into the pond, subsequent catch dates, weight at each catch, and whether the fish appeared to be "soft bellied" (empty stomach) or "hard bellied" (full stomach) at each catch. please note that i wanted to make sure i was giving each fish a fair shake as i considered its potential. i did not want to compare a pre-spawn weight one year to a post-spawn weight the next. i did not want to compare a fish with a full stomach one year to that same fish with an empty belly the next. we all know that even a relatively small bass can gain 6 oz. of body weight in one feeding binge. i wanted to make sure i was always comparing apples to apples. each time i caught a project fish, i was extremely careful with it making every effort to keep it safe and avoid injury.

i probably don't have to tell you the rest of the story. i was absolutely amazed at how quickly i got to know my fish and could recognize them both in and out of the water by their appearance, and if you can believe it, their own unique mannerisms and habits. some were always shy. some were always naturally curious. some were consistently aggressive. before i knew it, i didn't even need the pictures to immediately identify each fish. soon, i didn't even really need the journal to be honest, even though keeping it made things more exact. using the story each fish told me about its potential through the statistics i recorded, i was able to easily identify the "blue chippers" - the fastest growing fish. i even sorted the fish into tiers, based on their potential. i tried to make sure that all my project fish were generously fed as long as they were showing acceptable growth. but i ALWAYS made sure sure that MAXIMUM food resources were allocated to top tier fish to squeeze every ounce of growth out of them that i possibly could.

that little journal forced me to do something very, very important - become familiar with my fish. to this day, i believe that is a vital ingredient in managing for trophies in a small pond. i was able to raise big fish because i was able to recognize the star performers and accurately evaluate potential. i could compare growth rates. i knew which fish to keep around and allocate resources to. i knew when a fish was an underachiever and needed to leave the pond to free up resources for the overachievers. to me, star quality in a fish is not determined by how big it is, unless it is huge already. a fish's star quality is determined by how fast they are getting big, in other words, their growth rate. at least that's the way i see it. right now, there are 3 pound fish in the pond that i value more highly than some of the 4's. why? because they are growing faster. they are getting every single ounce of growth possible out of each growing season. soon these young butterballs will surpass their older counterparts. in time they'll become the tales that my daughter and i tell with big smiles on our faces, and the pictures that have my friends drooling. and it's in those moments that i can't help but fondly recall how it all started with a dream, a few goals, and a notebook.


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Will finding identification marks on each fish is a good idea. I was moving toward the tattoos. LOL
But everything you are stating makes sense. Just gotta put a little more time in the though process. JP keep us up dated with pictures. I’ll have to go back and start looking at the pictures I’ve been taking. This will help me know, did I catch five fish are the same dummy five times?


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o.k., here are my attempts at answers. please keep in mind these are just my opinions based on my own observations. i don't claim to be an expert by any stretch of the imagination, just a guy who does this for fun.

"You mentioned that you always did your best to give maximum allocation of food resourses to your top achievers. 1.) How do you know what food they wanted the most? (ie. flushing the stomach contents, or?) 2.) Have you found a way to "know" what size food a certain size fish wants to quickly achieve max size or are you taking a SWAG(sophisticated wild a*s guess)?"

don, i can tell you would be a good chess player. you seem to be able to take a look at something and automatically think a few moves ahead. this will serve you well in pond management.
at first, it was not a matter of knowing "what" food they wanted, because they all got the same thing - small bluegill and green sunfish. while this is probably not the best forage fish to stock for the sole purpose of feeding bass, it worked for me because i could get all the gills i wanted for free. and i also eventually wanted big some bluegills in the pond to catch as well. in addition to the gills, based on what i saw around the pond, i'm sure that my fish gobbled up an occasional frog. there were plenty of crawdad chimneys and holes around the pond, so i figured they had to be munching on those frequently as well. in time the fish seemed to know when i was coming with a
load of bluegills for dinner and they would "meet" me at the waters edge. i watched the way they behaved and ate, not just the group as a whole, but each individual fish. needless to say, this served me well as i quickly found out that some fish had very distinctive "personalities" for lack of a better way of saying it. over time, i began to process what i saw and learned through these observations, and crazy as it seemed, began to believe that i could "feed train" these "wild" bass and convert them to a cheap, artificial food source that would free up more of my time. and that's exactly what i did. even though at the time i thought the idea would never work, in hindsight, i realize that it made perfect sense and it was staring me in the face the whole time. i did not figure out anything really. the fish "told" me how to feed train them through their own behavior. it was plain as the nose on my face. i just wish i hadn't been so blind and could've figured it out earlier. sure would've saved myself a lot of trouble. i've since learned the best times and opportunities for "feed training" a completely wild fish. it doesn't work with all of them. but you'd be amazed to know how many of them it does work with. and really, a feed training program doesn't have to "take" with every fish in your pond. think about it and do the math. if feed training only "takes" with 25% the bass in your pond, then you have immediately increased the natural food resources available to the other 3/4 of your non feed trained bass population by 25%! you just freed up 25% of your forage fish resources. how's THAT for a return on your investment? in the real world, i'm all over any investment that almost immediately guarantees a return of 25%. done correctly in the pond world, this process almost guarantees that the % of your population that for whatever reason will never become feed trained will never want for food either. i guess what i'm saying is that feed training does not have to be an "all or nothing" proposition to be a highly pracical and effective intervention in a pond.

to answer your second question, in a word, yes. although i don't think it's a certain "size" food as much as it is a certain "amount", particularly with an artificial food source since obtaining an artificial food source does not represent a significant energy expenditure for a bass. with a natural food source, it's kinda like making change at the grocery store with a very important twist. a half pound of bluegill meat is a half pound of bluegill meat. whether it's one 8 oz. bluegill a bass eats, or 2 4 ouncers, it's still 8 oz. of food. here's what you have to consider though. the bass has to expend more calories and energy to obtain the two 4 ouncers because that's 2 separate hunts and captures instead of one. the smaller the portions, the more energy required to obtain them. and the energy required to attain food to a degree offsets the nutritional value of the food once it is captured. so the logic is simple, when possible, i think bigger food is better.

wow, i kinda got ahead of myself on your question don. you have a sneaky way of asking seemingly small and simple questions that really aren't very small and simple at all. i'll have to watch out for that. just kiddin' bud. very good questions. i'll have to stop here for now.

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 Originally Posted By: jignpig
in time the fish seemed to know when i was coming with a
load of bluegills for dinner and they would "meet" me at the waters edge. i watched the way they behaved and ate, not just the group as a whole, but each individual fish. needless to say, this served me well as i quickly found out that some fish had very distinctive "personalities" for lack of a better way of saying it.

\:D I'm crackin up! \:D
I don't normally read alot of the fish stuff cuz it just ain't me....but this is above and beyond. JnP is likeThe Fish Whisperer.

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thanks, i guess. and by the way, i AM available to manage your retirement funds. just cash in your plan and send me the money. i'll see what i can do. ;\)

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 Originally Posted By: RC51
"i said earlier that i had stocked the pond with "wild" fish that i had caught at other locations, mostly fish in the 2 pound range."

Hey Jig,
Question about above quote. I have been told and read time and time again that this is a big no,no. Is this part of your thinking out of the management box? I actually was going to do this myself as I belive most of my bass are stunted from several years of non management but was told and read not to do this as it can lead to bad results? But it looks like you did fine with it? Your thoughts?


rc, i'll say this. i'm gonna try to be careful here, yet at the same time completely answer your question. hopefully i'll do at least one of those things anyway. anytime i have someone tell me something, i consider who's doing the telling and why they're telling what they're telling. there are sometimes agendas at work. ;\) all i know is wild fish have worked just fine for me. better than fine really. i have been able to personally select each fish that goes in the pond based on my own pre-determined criteria and rating system. a fish that appears young and healthy with above average weight for its apparent age (comparing its body mass to the size of its head fins and tail) MIGHT go in the pond if i have room or if it's an especially impressive specimen. any fish that is in at least average shape and is easily identifiable by a distinctive mark will PROBABLY go in the pond, because recognizing them is so much easier. any fish that meets both of those criteria will DEFINITELY go in the pond, even if i have to cull one or more others to make room.

how many hatcheries or farms would let you come in and hand pick the bass you wanted from all of their entire stock at a bargain basement price? if you know of one, hop on that deal. yet that's exactly what i am able to do with the wild fish i get. and mine are FREE (well they do cost a fishing license, gas, tackle, etc. i guess)

i think one of the reasons folks are warned about putting wild fish in their ponds is because the temptation is to go out and catch an 8 pounder and chunk it in your pond, thinking how it'll be so much easier to turn that one into a giant because it's pretty big already. i learned back a LONG time ago that this was usually a huge mistake. the "big fish stocked in a small pond" thing hardly ever seemed to work out for me. usually both the fish and the pond suffered. i think big bass tend to be much more "set in their ways" than a younger fish. once they are uprooted from a spot they've lived in since birth, it is hard for them to make the necessary adjustments to thrive in another environment. and to make matters worse, they have only a limited time to make those adjustments as they are older already. in simple terms, that 8 pounder could turn into a skinny 6.5 in short order before it's ever able to adjust to its new environment. and by then it might be too late. at best, you might be able to get that fish slightly above the 8 pound mark again before you're out of time. not only that, but people fail to fully realize the massive food requirements for a large bass. stocking even one very large bass in your pond could completely wreck your food chain if you are not careful. i'm not saying that taking big fish out of the wild and successfully making them grow even bigger in small ponds is impossible. i'm just saying i think it's difficult and could prove costly to both the bass and your pond if you don't have a very specific plan in place for specifically meeting the needs of that one fish. i've played around with it a lot, and i prefer the 2 pounders. i can grow those big soon enough. o.k. that was a little off course, but that's probably one of the reasons you have heard not to stock wild fish.

the benefit of stocking the same year class of fish from a hatchery or farm is that at least initially you know exactly how old each fish is and that each fish is starting on a level playing field. it is quite easy with those fish after only a year to see who the stars of the bunch are probably gonna be. probably don't even need a journal because you can look at them and plainly tell. there is no guesswork involved. but even then, after a few spawns its not usually so clear anymore. and if you are not careful, even with farm fish, it can become convoluted in a hurry.

i'll just say this. i know of 3 ponds around here that were stocked with wild fish and taken care of properly. know what they all have in common? big fish. i think it has more to do with the management than the type of fish. you can take a super expensive "pedigreed" fla. strain or one of those newfangled "tiger bass" with all the bells and whistles and if she lives in a poor environment and is poorly fed, you've wasted your money. on the other hand, you can take a regular old "mutt bass" and put it in an optimum environment with good food intake, and one day that fish is gonna drop some jaws.

hope that helps bud. \:\)

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Hey Jig,

Thanks I never thought of it that way. That makes more since. So once I get my forage base right and my current bass under control i may just try that plan myself to see what I can do with it. I believe my current bass are all fairly old and stunted. They all seem to be 8 to 13 inches long. So I am going to continue to yank em!! Till I feel good about it and maybe try your plan. I don't really want BIG,BIG bass anyway 2 to 4 pounders would be GREAT for me!

Thx,


The only difference between a rut and a Grave is the depth. So get up get out of that rut and get moving!! Time to work!!
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Now that's hardcore. I try to explain to pond owners, looking to grow trophy bass, basically the same process your doing. Some are diligent some are not. It is important to learn to recognize young fast growing fish, especially females and keep them around and growing.


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The other thing about that plan is this. If you are putting in selective 2 lbs bass and no smaller in your pond it would not be hard to figure out what bass need to go if your bass are like mine old and stunted with nowhere to go. I think I may be catching on to some of this. I may be slow but I think I get it.


The only difference between a rut and a Grave is the depth. So get up get out of that rut and get moving!! Time to work!!
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Jignpig, how big is your pond and how many bass are you currently tracking in your journal?


Does the name Pavlov ring a bell?
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pond is 2-3 acres. not mine. don't use a journal anymore. i haven't for a while. couldn't even tell ya where it is now or if i even still have it. truth is, i don't have to use one anymore. i was able to do away with it fairly quickly once i was sure of what i was doing. i did it at first to force myself into good management habits. you will always be able to keep things more "exact" with a journal. but the bottom line is that you just need to figure out which fish are your star players and which ones are not. as we have touched on before, if you want lunkers, young, fast growing females are where it's at. i don't want anyone to look at this journal idea as if it's a permanent ball and chain that you have to continually use, update, fret over, and carry to the pond with you every outing. that just wouldn't be any fun. the whole point of the journal for me was that i knew it would force me into proper channels of thinking and make me pay attention to the fish i was managing. and too, the journal served as written and photographic affirmation to me that my plan was working and i wasn't wasting my time. that helped me build more confidence and momentum, which in turn inspired me to try new stuff. after that it was like a line of dominos falling. it was so cool how validated decisions or documented observations led to newer, bolder strategies. the way i looked at it was i could always go backwards if i had to, but i didn't really want to so i kept pressing forward and pushing the envelope. soon, it was like i was on cruise control. no journal necessary. it's neat how success tends to breed confidence and confidence tends to breed more success. but i am absolutely convinced that i could have not done nearly as well if i hadn't started with the journal. it kept me accountable to my goals and plan. it provided me with the statistical info i needed to make sound decisions. and it gave me even more confidence and inspiration when i was able to see that a poor country boy like me with no pond experience and no fancy letters behind his name could against all odds make this thing work.



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What is the best way to determine the males from the females? It's a dumb question but I'm a rookie to all of this. Do you just look for the fat ones?? My wife will kill me for that one if she hears it! Seriously, I have no idea so somebody please ckue me in.
Thanks,


It's true hard work never killed anybody, but I figure, why take the chance?
Ronald Reagan
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The good Brian



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here's a good start.

http://www.pondboss.com/forums/ubbthreads.php?ubb=showflat&Number=209347#Post209347

if you're like me though and don't like probing fish with straws, the best thing to do is wait until the spawn i think. when you find a nest with one fish on it, that is almost always the male. if there are 2 fish, the smaller is usually the male. if both appear to be the same size, 9 times out of 10 the male will be the one that attacks your bait first. having a good pair of polarized sun glasses will really help you in finding and fishing the beds. hope that helps.

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Cisco,

As a general rule the vent or scaleless urogenital opening in a male largemouth bass tends to be more circular in appearance while the opening in a female largemouth tends to be more elliptical. Having said this, however, I should hasten to note that few biologists or fisheries managers rely on this method of determining the sex of a fish, because even to the well trained eye it results too often in mis-identification.


It isn't real easy. Except around this time of year. The females will have a very large stomache and males should look fairly normal still. You can tell trust me. Very plump tummy full of eggs! They will look like they have a little football in their stomache. \:\) Other then the spawning time it is tough!

Hope that helps.


The only difference between a rut and a Grave is the depth. So get up get out of that rut and get moving!! Time to work!!
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