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Sunil Offline OP
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My neighbor, Lee, filled a new 1/5 to 1/6 acre pond, 8' max depth, artesian spring fed with run off around July 2021.

Over the late summer of 2021, we put in about 12 dozen fatheads from a local bait shop, and from August to September '21, we put in (50) mature bluegill and redear sunfish from my neighborhood pond. In January of 2022, we saw fathead fry in the pond.

In Spring 2022, April time frame, we put in 20 lbs of fatheads. In May, we put in an additional (35) mature bluegill or redear.

The original plan was to stock SMB, YP, HSB, and some CC this Fall '22.

The pond is way, way loaded with fatheads of most all sizes. If you watch a patch of water, and don't think you see anything, you'll eventually see newly born fathead fry. It's crazy, and it's scared me a bit without real predators in the pond yet.

So, my question is, how much does an adult bluegill or readear eat fatheads of all sizes? I'm just trying to calm myself by thinking these (85) bluegill are helping thin the fathead population. I will often see the bluegill just suspending in a cloud of fathead frye just seeming to inhale.

Last Wednesday, we were able to stock (11) SMB in the 2" range. We started to pursue options for a summer stocking to get some predators in the pond. Probably going to get some YP, HSB, and CC in the next week to 10 days. Just moving up the schedule.


Excerpt from Robert Crais' "The Monkey's Raincoat:"
"She took another microscopic bite of her sandwich, then pushed it away. Maybe she absorbed nutrients from her surroundings."

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Just boiling down to the basic question...who has experience or knowledge about how much adult bluegill we eat fathead minnows?


Excerpt from Robert Crais' "The Monkey's Raincoat:"
"She took another microscopic bite of her sandwich, then pushed it away. Maybe she absorbed nutrients from her surroundings."

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I just have knowledge from other's experience in the form of scientific experiments. Yes, BG eat FHM and they are likely getting their fill of them. To reduce the FHM will require a predator that eliminates adult FHM preventing as much reproduction. The FHM can also become self limiting and insects (if enough of a population of predator insects establish) can also limit FHM below carrying capacity. I would think the situation of ideal for the predators stocked this fall.

I'd bet that the adult BG that the were stocked have grown substantially.


It isn't what we don't know that gives us trouble, it's what we know that ain't so - Will Rogers


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I have knowledge from actual personal experience. I had roughly 2 dozen adult BG in a 100 gallon Po'Boy Ras and added separate batches of roughly 36 each Gambusia and FHM. The Gams went in first, and it took 4 days for the BG to catch and eat all of them in a 100 gallon trough. Then I put the FHM in; they were all gone in 2 days.

So yes, BG will eat adult FHM, and can catch them easier than the faster, smaller Gambusia. I suspect BG would have no trouble catching and eating juvenile FHM as well.


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Thanks everyone!


Excerpt from Robert Crais' "The Monkey's Raincoat:"
"She took another microscopic bite of her sandwich, then pushed it away. Maybe she absorbed nutrients from her surroundings."

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Over time the BG will exterminate the FH and stunt without additional food and predation upon them. Gams are better at avoiding extermination but will be greatly reduced in number.

Two things happen at the same time. Adult BG and RES eat all sizes of FH and the BG offspring eat all the subsequent FH fry. With a short lifespan and high natural mortality, the number of FH maturing and reproducing gets low quickly and with few fry surviving to maturity there are not enough survivors to establish/continue.
















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Sunil Offline OP
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Thanks, Eric.

Tomorrow, I'm picking up (100) Yellow Perch, 3-4" and (5) Channel Cats, 3-5".

We hope to pull off a YP spawn in Spring 2023.


Excerpt from Robert Crais' "The Monkey's Raincoat:"
"She took another microscopic bite of her sandwich, then pushed it away. Maybe she absorbed nutrients from her surroundings."

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My trophy lepomis pond is male only sunfish species (csbg, res) and hybrids (hbg, bres) with forage species of fhm, pk shrimp, crayfish and supplemental optimal bg and lmb pellets. .25 ac pond with about 100 fish ranging from 9-12”. All forage is abundant, stocked 10 smb to try and manage the crays plus I run 20 cray traps March - November. I’ve witnessed bg slurp dozens of juvenile fhm just hovering in the shadow of the shoreline riprap. This doesn’t serve as any advice for you, Sunil - but just wanted to share my experience with the family as it’s kinda related. I have 9 ponds and this is my far my favorite to manage. I plan on adding gams and bmn just for fun this fall. Goal is for every fish caught to exceed 10” and average 120+ wr.


Many men go fishing all of their lives without knowing that it is not fish they are after. ~ Henry David Thoreau

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TJ, my original question was asked to give me some peace of mind that I'm not going to have some kind of massive overload of biomass from all the fatheads reproducing before predators get added in.

So, it's good to hear that these (85) BG/RES may be doing some population control.

We are also feeding Optimal Bluegill, and the BG/RES don't feed that aggressively...maybe because they are stuffed!!!

Leaving to get the YP and CC shortly.


Excerpt from Robert Crais' "The Monkey's Raincoat:"
"She took another microscopic bite of her sandwich, then pushed it away. Maybe she absorbed nutrients from her surroundings."

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Originally Posted by Sunil
Leaving to get the YP and CC shortly.

Drive safe with that load!

I hope all of your new fish stay cool and happy all of the way to their new home.

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This will be an interesting one to watch for over time results.
















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Eric, I cannot say for certain that I've had a Bluegill spawn. We had 50 adults in last late summer/fall, and 35 more in April/May. I did see a small colony of 5-6 beds, but again, no sign of YOY/Fingerling bluegill.

I put in (100) YP in the 4" range, (6) Channel Cats in the 3-5" range, and (6) HSB in the less than 2" range today.

Pure joy!


Excerpt from Robert Crais' "The Monkey's Raincoat:"
"She took another microscopic bite of her sandwich, then pushed it away. Maybe she absorbed nutrients from her surroundings."

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Pond is polluted with fatheads of all sizes.


Excerpt from Robert Crais' "The Monkey's Raincoat:"
"She took another microscopic bite of her sandwich, then pushed it away. Maybe she absorbed nutrients from her surroundings."

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Originally Posted by Sunil
Pond is polluted with fatheads of all sizes.

Good thing you added some "pollution scrubbers"!

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Originally Posted by FishinRod
Originally Posted by Sunil
Pond is polluted with fatheads of all sizes.

Good thing you added some "pollution scrubbers"!


Essentially, yes!!

I can't wait to see exploding balls of fatheads as they get chased by SMB, HSB, YP, or even CC. I'm not sure how long I'll have to wait to see that!!!


Excerpt from Robert Crais' "The Monkey's Raincoat:"
"She took another microscopic bite of her sandwich, then pushed it away. Maybe she absorbed nutrients from her surroundings."

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It won't take long with hungry fish !!
















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So far, we've seen (15) dead Yellow Perch out of (100) stocked.

Tomorrow, I'm getting about (30) more YP and (20) SMB.


Excerpt from Robert Crais' "The Monkey's Raincoat:"
"She took another microscopic bite of her sandwich, then pushed it away. Maybe she absorbed nutrients from her surroundings."

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Originally Posted by Sunil
So far, we've seen (15) dead Yellow Perch out of (100) stocked.

Tomorrow, I'm getting about (30) more YP and (20) SMB.

Dang it! frown

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Originally Posted by Sunil
So far, we've seen (15) dead Yellow Perch out of (100) stocked.

Tomorrow, I'm getting about (30) more YP and (20) SMB.


Dang. It takes a few days for the dead fish to generate enough decomp gasses to float the fish. Not all will float too.

I brought back 200 4"-6" HSB and a few hundred HBG and put them in the holding tanks. So far about 25% have croaked. HSB because they aren't feed trained, HSB because they had a minor ick infection when picked up and due to hauling stress - they are more fragile for me to haul than Golden Shiners (at least it seems that way to me).

The supplier thought they had the ick infection beat, I didn't see any on the fish in the haul tanks but maybe that weakened the fish just enough that the haul did the weaker ones in. I told my customers that I wouldn't be stocking the HSB right now, that they'd be stocked in the Fall when the water cools down. I'd rather have the fish die here than in the customers ponds.


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Yeah, all these YP were floaters, and were very, very thin, so it doesn't look like they were eating.

They looked very healthy going in.

Of those (85) adult BG we put in, we've had about 5-6 mortalities, so I don't know if there's something hard for new fish to adapt to in this pond. The dead BG were very, very fat and healthy looking.


Excerpt from Robert Crais' "The Monkey's Raincoat:"
"She took another microscopic bite of her sandwich, then pushed it away. Maybe she absorbed nutrients from her surroundings."

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Earlier today, I put in (30) Yellow Perch, and (34) fingerling SMB. The SMB were 1" at best. Some of the YP were maybe 4+".

I released the SMB in various shallow rock piles and observed a few of them around the rocks about an hour after release.


Excerpt from Robert Crais' "The Monkey's Raincoat:"
"She took another microscopic bite of her sandwich, then pushed it away. Maybe she absorbed nutrients from her surroundings."

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Originally Posted by Sunil
Earlier today, I put in (30) Yellow Perch, and (34) fingerling SMB. The SMB were 1" at best.

If you can catch one of the 1" SMB, you might be able to break Theo's recent BG record! grin

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The SMB were so small that I actually netted them out to look at each one. Early on, when I netted about 10+, one did look like a bluegill. On closer inspection, it was a small smallie.


Excerpt from Robert Crais' "The Monkey's Raincoat:"
"She took another microscopic bite of her sandwich, then pushed it away. Maybe she absorbed nutrients from her surroundings."

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We are having a big fish kill in this pond. Lost about 25 adult bluegill. No sign of distress on them. We've also found about 10 dead Yellow Perch and a few dead smallies.


Not sure what's causing this, but I'm suspecting some kind of D.O. crash, which surprises me. Part of me wonders, if it was a D.O. crash, if it was due to too many fathead minnows.


Excerpt from Robert Crais' "The Monkey's Raincoat:"
"She took another microscopic bite of her sandwich, then pushed it away. Maybe she absorbed nutrients from her surroundings."

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Bummer!

I hope it resolves in your favor soon.

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