Pond Boss Forums STOCKING A NEW POND Creating the food chain Creating a perfect balance

I am thinking that once my 6 plus acre lake is built I will first spread a few inches of compost from the barnyard over its entire basin, then while it fills up Ill shop around for some good native water plants, then give the water time to establish its microorganism population, then maybe the following spring introduce crayfish, minnows, bluegill fingerlings, and redear fingerlings, give them a year or so to establish, then there should be a well established forage base.

After careful consideration with all the awesome info from all of you I think I will stay with a main predator that I know does well here, from first hand experience, one that will reproduce, but its reproduction can be controlled to a degree with habitat modification, and one that I love fishing for and eating enough that it will not be a chore but a pleasure to be its main population control. The Blue Catfish, and for my secondary predator, I will stock black crappie.

I'll be very interested to see how that combination works out. There has been past talk of blue catfish/HSB combination. I think if you stocked HSB and blue cats gave them a bit of a head start on the black crappies would be your best chance at keeping the crappies under control. I would not give your BG any head start on the blue catfish or HSB. If anything I would stock the BG and crappies a couple years after the blue cats and HSB go in...

So give the minnows a head start but not the BG or crappie, because those two will outproduce the bluecats, I like the hybrid bass, those stripers at Monroe reservoir are a blast to catch

If you like HSB consider YP/RES/HSB with HSB as top predator. Check out the ones James can grow in his pond:

http://forums.pondboss.com/ubbthreads.php?ubb=showflat&Number=348639#Post348639

wow

Do a LOT of reading on here about stocking crappie in a pond that is smaller than 25 or so acres. If you decide to go that route, you may be the first to get it balanced without a lot of labor involved. But then again, with a 6 acre pond, if you don't get it right the first time it will take a lot of work and $$ to fix it.....

Honestly if you could at all manage without the crappie I would do so. They are notoriously difficult to control and it seems most people end up with thousands of stunted, 3" fish and nothing to put on the dinner plate.

Perfect balance can be easily achieved. For a short time.

Yup, the little buggers multiply like crazy. Heed the advice here. Even short term, I see the problem already and it hasn't been a year yet.

As usual it all depends on your situation. The person I bought my fish from is a very avid fish person, and swears up and down that BC are not an issue in our area, and can coexist in smaller ponds without taking over. However I am not seeing that anything is controlling their numbers in my pond yet. They probably needed to be added a year after I had some larger top dogs, like my WE getting into to the 12 inch plus range to pinch off the little guys for a longer time before they got too large to eat.

I will be manually thinning the BC herds soon to give my perch a chance in the spring to make babies that survive. Luckily the BC are schooling so a throw net should catch a few to help maintain balance.

I think the only time BC numbers are controlled is if there are a lot of other fish present that eat the babies in enough quantity, can eat a larger span of size classes, and are hungry active fish.

I would suspect even more problems in a fed pond or nutrient rich pond with low visibility that allowed the BC to grow out of edible range too fast.

Well apparently crappie are out, Ill have to come up with something else for the smaller secondary predator any suggestions

You have been thinking about HSB with the bluecatfish, you want more predators besides that?........How about SMB, or even YP would be a predator ( I think ).

If you were wanting the BC because of how good they taste, a good alternate IMO would be WE! Walleye are some of the best eating fish around I think and in a 6 acre pond you could have some decent sized ones.

So if you went Bluecat, HSB, and WE, with BG, and RES and FHM/or Golden Shiners you would be good to go.

Keep in mind HSB dont spawn in ponds or their not supposed to anyway so you would not get an over population of them so if you put in 100 of them you would have 100 or less of course but never more unless you buy some more. That's the one thing I like about HSB you can control their population quite easy!

RC

I thank everyone for these great ideas and opinions

If you stock WE with blue cats the original stocking is about all the WE you will get. Bcats are 'heavy predators'. Walleye are a bottom oriented fish and once bcats get big (5+lbs) I think they will eat all new stocked WE even if WE are 12"-13" long. Not a good combination for long term success in IMO.

And they may eat your small dog if takes a swim.

I love blue cats, they can get huge, fight like mad, and taste good at the end of it all, they will be my priority

Then you need lots of small BG , shad type minnows and no LMB to eat the BC babies and BG.

I dont really care for LMB, I prefer the cats, I know that this probably unusual, as most folks I know love LMB, but me, give me a catfish hole anyday, so blues, bgs, and other forage fish

I think its great that you have an idea/goal of what you really want, and stick with. It may not be a popular choice, but the pros here will give you the best advice to see it thru.

Thanks F&C

I think it will be an interesting project. However, at some point, you may need to start trapping coons to feed them. They will become the ultimate 1,000 pound gorilla.

Perfect balance will be tough to maintain.

Good one Dave good thing Im a farmer, and part time trapper, it will give me a good place to dispose of my carcasses,

Dead raccoon on a 12/0 hook with 80# braid on one of those gator rods

oh yeah

Heck, we've used the kids as saltwater bait -- no hooks involved.

I'd probably be arrested if I posted pictures of our two boys, with big soft rope tied around their waists, while they waded in the beautiful shallow, warm, and calm waters at the mouth of Chesapeake Bay, where it becomes part of the Atlantic Ocean.

Back in the mid/late 1970s, one of my offices was in Virginia Beach, VA. We often stored our tent camper in the area during the summer months, and spent frequent weekends at what is now known as First Landing State Park. My office was less than two miles away.

We'd tie a big fat soft rope around the kid's bellies. To that we'd tie some cotton cord, with chicken necks or chicken backs tied to the other end. We'd send the kids out wading while my wife and I walked behind them with crab nets.

Over 35 years later, "the kids" still tell stories of how I used them for bait in the Atlantic Ocean.

By the way, we all sure enjoyed a lot of fresh crab dinners in those days.