Pond Boss Forums MANAGING AN EXISTING POND Feeding What % of the fish go to feeder??????

I have about 2 acre BOW and one TH feeder. Stocked 2500 fingerling and 800 (3-5")adult CNBG in February. I have had at least 2 spawns. When the feeder goes off, or I hand feed by the feeder, the water erupts with CNBG feeding.

I built my new floating dock and it about 100' from the feeder and did some hand feeding off of it last night. I noticed those fish didn't seem to know what feed was and fed very timidly at first. Slowly they began feeding a little better. This was 20 minutes before when the feeder went off. When feeder did go off, it was feeding over there as usual.

I'm feeding about 1.5#s feed morning and afternoon out of the feeder, plus what I hand feed.

My question is what % of the CNBG in a pond this size do you think I'm feeding at the feeder? 10%.....30%.... more, less?

I think the rule of thumb is one feeder per surface acre of water. Larger bodys of water the fish are spread out allot and don't always take to the feed until the fish numbers are much higher.

I am not a pro but do like reading.

I see this same issue on my 1 acre pond. In the immediate area of the feeder fish all over the place. Throw food 100 feet away and not so much action.... I believe I have some fish on the back side of my pond that may not even know I have a feeder... lol. In a 2 acre pond I can see this being a issue for sure... Way to much competition by the feeder so some smaller fish may just stay away.... Percentage of fish feed by feeder? I have no idea how you could tell that. I would think that could change from day to day. Specially when bigger BG are on their beds...

RC

What surprised me was how the fish reacted to the food. They didn't act like they had ever seen feed. I could see the fish, water is clear, and they would swim under the feed watching it till it started to sink or make many inspection swim by's before taking the feed.

Also fish line up at the feeder, with most being in the 2-5" range. Very easy to see. I obviously can't see the fish further out in deeper water around feeder, but some of fish around the dock are the largest I have seen. I didn't realize I had any that large.

Yeah I can see my fish jockeying for position about 30 mins to an hour before feeder goes off... It's crazy! Look out there with binoculars and they are everywhere!! They know when that food from heaven is coming round!! LOL... Or at least some of them do...

RC

Some of my much larger perch are at the opposite end of the pond from the feeder.
They also strike a lot harder when hitting a jig. I doubt they have any idea that there's a feeder at the other end of the pond. I pretty much assume that they are females, so I release them. I still have schools of FHM cruising the shorelines. Not as many as last year. I think my one yr old SMB, and HSB are working them over.

In the trophy pond I hand feed around the entire perimeter, but do have a "main" spot where I concentrate. There will be fish that hit the feed all around, however. Whatever it takes to up the number of mouths at the dinner table.

Since I'm in the process of harvesting, last Saturday morning while feeding at 7am, I caught 1 HSB and 2 LMB in the feeding zone.

2 hours later while fishing the perimeter of my 2 acre pond, I caught 3 more LMB, 2 at the opposite end of where I feed, nearly 400' away and they were hunkered in next to some lay-downs. To my surprise when I cleaned them, all 5 had AM LMB pellets in their bellies. All LMB were between 2.75 & 3 lb.

Maybe it's normal but I was very surprised to see that they will travel that far for the 7am feeding. And I religiously feed at 7am every morning, by hand in the same area, and have for the past 3-4 years.

If I wait until 7:30, there's very little activity and none after 8am, and like others, there's no activity if I throw food outside of the "feed zone".

Anyone have any experience or knowledge in fish travelling towards the dinner bell? And maybe how far they will, or have travelled?

I have been feeding my CC and BG since early spring, by hand, always in the same place. I tried a different area today with a few handfuls, and only a few of the catfish fed, no BG. I went back to the usual area, and had furious feeding.

My fish dinner bell is a Polaris 900 Ranger UTV. Anytime I drive around the pond fish wakes head towards me. They hear/feel the thumping of the 2 cylinder engine. If I walk around a few will come, but it is the Polaris sound they love. They associate it with feed.

It is what I feed out of every day, around the entire perimeter of the 3 acre pond.

Once I started throwing a little AM400 very near shore, the very small BG now line up and will watch me waiting for their feed if I pull up to one spot. If you want to get your small fish started on pellets early, the BB size pellets of the AM400 do the trick. Feed it in 6" of water.

BrianL, you are asking the same question I have asked myself. I have not come up with an answer I run 3 TH's on my 3.5 acres from day one, some 20 months ago, in a heavy forage stocked pond. And what I see is the smaller yoy cnbg learn pretty fast where the feeders are located. I see mostly 3 to 5" cnbg at the feeders with 1 to 2" smaller ones located closer the feeder in the shallower water. I am not sure where the larger ones are, I rarely see the larger 8 to 10" cnbg, but I know they are there. They have been feed daily several times a day for the past 20 months. I do see them on occasion. But where are they full time? Not sure, but they are there

Tracy

A little off the subject but an interesting observation. My th feeder makes a humming noise right before it goes off. My fish hear or feel that and come running out from under the dock before there is ever any food. I can't hear it but my wife and grandson can. Another funny thing is...I stand right next to my feeder when it goes off and on several occasions I have made a loud growling noise like clearing my throat and my fish take off from under the dock thinking it is the feeder going off!! Brings up the question... can fish hear out of water noises by soundwave vibrations? And yes, I am sober!!

Absolutely. They also can see what's above the water surface around them.

Sure they can. I can stand on the shore and call " Here fishy", and they will come running. Never gets old.

I believe that, Al!

I could swear there's times the HSB are hitting the AM LMB pellets before they even hit the water. Like they see them coming!

Watching the HSB attack the pellets is definitely my favorite part of every day, and no better way to start it!

Back to the original question. After reading this post this morning I made a beeline out to the pond to do a experiment. In a year and a half I have fed at the same spot off my dock with the th feeder. Went before it went off and I threw a little food all around the far end and the opposite side from the feeder. Approx. 300 ft away. Very little activity and some never got ate. Feeder went off about 5 minutes later back on the other end and it was frenzy as usual. I tossed a little more food far away from the feeder again and it appeared ONLY about 20-40 fish were hanging around to feed. This is a 2 acre pond. So in my case at least for today... I would say at least 90% of what fed were at the feeder!!! Note: I also threw food around all the submerged structure around the edges of the pond and even within 50 ft of one side of the dock and NO ACTION! They are strongly keyed in on the feed zone only!!

My deal was a little different. I could see 100s of fish swimming under the feed on the dock, they just would not eat it. They did eventually, but FHM started first, then small CNBG, then the bigger CNBG would feed. It took about 10 minutes for them to eat 2 handfuls the first time. Last night they fed much much better. Not like at the feeder, but still very good. I don't know if they had not seen feed before, or since that area had never had food in it, they didn't trust the feed?

Originally I thought the vast majority would go to feeder, but when fish only +/- 100' away didn't act like they knew what feed was I started questioning if that was the case.

This pic kind of shows what I'm talking about. I was actually trying to get a picture of a VERY large FHM.

BrianL, I'm not sure it's possible to figure out what the % of total CNBG are eating, but I've had it take as few as 2 days, and as long as 3 weeks to get the fish accustomed to a new feeder location and throw times. I'll hand feed at those locations until I feel comfortable with a 1 second throw getting completely eatten.

My experience has been that starting with a location that's spawn friendly, has close access to deeper water, and has adequate cover(if needed) to protect the CNBG while they're eating would give you the best chance of feeding as many fish as possible.

July 19th is almost here, so I'll be out checking for new CNBG beds and possible locations for additional high percentage feeder locations. My wife told me I'm wasting my time, because unfortunately she's figured out that more feeders equal more fish food.

A few observations I have made.

I talked about the thumping sound the UTV makes that the fish relate to in an above post. Another thing is that as I drive around right next to the water larger fish will swim right up next to shore and I can see them. Not the largest BG, but ones in the 6-7" range. But if I stop, they quickly go away. If I stop and stay still long enough and continue to put out some new feed they eventually will get used to my presence and come back but are wary. Any movement and they are gone.

Similar but to a lesser degree if I am walking the perimeter. A few grasshoppers will scare out into the water as I am walking and the BG will follow me around for them. But if I stop, the BG go away. Start walking and here they come. I think it is a fear of above water predators that keep the BG away. Things like GBH. So they are very leery of anything out of the ordinary they see above water.

If I just walk up to the pond and throw out some feed I will initially have very few takers. Eventually as a few start splashing as they take the feed it will draw in others and if done long enough a large group of fish will end up eating. But if I pull up in the UTV (the thing/sound they are used to when getting fed) BAM, they are there in droves.

I think if a person wanted to hand feed in random places and wanted the fish to come instantly anywhere around the pond, if he would take a pipe or bucket and bang it a few seconds before throwing feed in the water, after a while the fish would associate whatever the consistent chosen "dinner bell" with feed. Then I think a person could walk up to any portion of the pond and make the dinner bell sound and the fish would come running. At least that is the way it works with the sound/vibration my UTV. Any time during daylight, any place I drive up to around the pond, the fish will come swimming up right to the UTV and wait to be fed. I can see the surface wakes mostly along the shore line but also 50' or more out in the pond coming toward me.

I think you can train fish like you can train a pasture of cows to come when you call. Sound travels through water very fast and fish are attuned to vibrations in the water. They can hear your footsteps when you walk out on a dock.

I have a friend who had some 6-10 lb CC that would eat out of his hand. He has a small 1/8 acre pond with a dock out to the middle. Unfortunately, he showed too many people, and when he came back from a week long trip, they were gone.

Snrub, does AM400 float or sink? I can't seem to recall. Thinking of putting a small amount in with my Optimal if it sinks.

Most of my Optimal Sunfish Food is being consumed by my CC before the BG get to it. Think I will feed the CC first with catfish pellets, then feed the Optimal. I need to make the sack of Optimal last a little longer.

I'm finding this very interesting! I too wondered how many fish are travelling to the feed zone, but now that I'm harvesting I'm finding they're traveling a long distance.

When I first started feeding, I would tap on the metal dock post (as suggested here) as their dinner bell. Once they knew when and where, I quit. I'm also guessing they're accustomed to the time I feed opposed to the sound of the ATV as I travel to the pond often, including in the morning before feeding time. But at 7am, they're there waiting! Not 6:30, not 7:30, but 7am.

As I've discovered the LMB are travelling the full length of the pond to feed, I'll start checking on BG caught in different areas of the pond as well. It's pretty evident when you open their bellies. And I'm guessing this will be a more accurate assessment since I feed in only one area of the pond, opposed to multiple areas.

I'd rather feed them where they're "stationed" so they're not losing weight travelling to and from the feed zone , But for me it's just not feasible.

That sounds like a plan to me John. Funny in my pond it is the opposite. The CC are lucky to get any and if they show up to the party late, they don't.

That may have to do with a couple of things though. First we have fished out a LOT of our CC. I don't know if it is just the hot weather we are not seeing them as much as we were this spring, or if we are actually getting the numbers fished down so there are not as many, but I just do not see the numbers of CC feeding that I used to. The other thing I do differently than many is I feed from the 4-wheeler. I drive in low gear while I toss the feed out with my left hand. I do this around the entire circumference of the pond. This tends to spread the feed out over a wide area rather than a large amount of feed in one area. So the thrown feed tends to only last a minute or two before it is gone. If it lasts longer than that in hot weather I cut the next feeding down some.

So I think spreading the feed out so much gives the BG an advantage because of their quickness and the fact that they seem to hug the shore line more so are often closer to the feed to begin with. My CC are in the 2-3# range and I do not care for them to get much larger anyway so I do not really care if they do not get much feed. Have been trying to fish them out of the pond (already catching several 5-6" fingerlings so we have had CC reproduction) but since hot weather they are not biting like they were earlier in the year.