Pond Boss Forums MANAGING AN EXISTING POND Evaluating and adjusting fish populations Help with an Overstocked pond

I've been a member for a while, but I believe this is the first time I've posted. I've enjoyed reading through the posts... a lot of knowledge contained in them, but now have a problem that I hope someone can help me with. I have a 2-1/2 acre pond that is overstocked with LMB. I've been catching and keeping LMB out of it over the past year. The size and number of LMB caught has been decreasing. Currently, I'm catching about 4 in an hour of fishing with conventional tackle; all less than 14 in long. The last fishing trip, I noticed what looked like a school of fish on my depth finder. I backed off and threw a crappie sized swimbait and immediately caught 3 approximately 6 in bass. Also, I set a perch trap to see what was there. I left the trap at 2 locations for an hour each and caught 5 small BG total. What should be my next step? Down scale to crappie lures to catch small fish? Stock BG? Thanks in advance for the help!

Smaller lures, a fish feeder/net combo.

Also If available in your area, a long term solution would be Hybrid Striped Bass. They grow fast and dont reproduce, and will pray on young LMB.



Good luck! Keep us updated! and welcome

How many bass (weight wise) have you removed so far this year?)

A Texas Hunter Feeder and Optimal Bluegill food will go a long ways to helping kick start the forage base.

I haven't been the best at keeping records but i believe I've caught around 130 this year... so probably around 70-80 lbs?

Good going. You are on your way to turning the pond around. I'd take out another 20# this year, trying to target the skinny looking fish, then concentrate on getting habitat in there for the forage fish, i.e. bluegills. I would start feeding the bluegills too, fish in better body condition will lay more eggs, resulting in a faster replenishment of forage fish in the pond.

Next year remove 50-60 pounds of bass and try to concentrate on removing the skinnier ones. You can catch a few, measure them, and then concentrate on fish that size to remove.