Pond Boss Forums STOCKING A NEW POND Raising Forage and Bait Size of forage bluegill stocking

I have a 1/3 acre forage pond with literally thousands of native bluegill and would like to begin transferring some of the bluegill to larger ponds with existing fish populations. Since some of the ponds have bass I'm curious about the minimum size of the bluegill for the best survival rates - I'm hoping for future breeders and not quick menu items.The forage pond bluegill range in size from 2" to around 7". Any recommendations on this ?

Hey Squeeky,

IMHO I would go with a MINIMUM BG size of 40% of the LMB length if you want to have a decent chance of having survivors. So as example, for 15 inch LMB I would go with a MINIMUM size BG of 6 inches.

Just my 1 cent. Hopefully, one of the pros will chime in.

Good Luck,

Bill D.

^^^^^^ what he said and you still might lose some BG to some hungry LMB. Not many though.

Several approaches to this which can work. The question is what you need and when ( the amount of BG forage increase over what time frame).
If you have to have 0 to < 5% loss then go with only 40% > BG. Depending on the extent of your BG shortage this may or may not cure the problem or it may take a while if you only have a small # of BG this size to add.
Another approach is to use some what smaller BG in larger #s. For example in the first method 10 6-7 inch BG per acre. In the second method use 5 inch BG at 50 per acre. More will be eaten but more will survive to spawn . Because of the shear #s involved the second method will work with 20 - 30% loss. It is a numbers game based on what you have available. Two key aids are timing ( adding 30 days +- first spawning date) using habituation for 24 hours and adequate cover ( Xmas trees or thick brush piles near spawning beds).

Thanks for the response and info. About 90% of the bluegill that I'm trapping are in the 2-3" range so I might have to wait a while to get them to the best survival size.