Pond Boss Forums STOCKING A NEW POND Types of fish to choose Stocking blue cat vs. channel cat

New member, new subcriber and first post but have read the forums on PB for several years while dreaming about my new pond(s).

I have 2 ponds being built. One is 2+ acres, 17' max depth, average 6-7', and the other one is 1-1/2 acres, 11' max depth, average of 6'+/-. They both should be completed mid-march this year. Bring on the spring rain! Both ponds are on my private ranch which would be fished primarily by friends and family. My plan was to stock BG/RES and FHM when the water level warranted and then LMB and CC later in both ponds. I'm thinking about putting Blue Cats instead of CC in the 2 acre pond and wanted to get everyone's opinion if this is a good idea or not. I think it would be fun for the kids (and myself of course) to fight the big BC's once in a while. Is this a good idea or not?

A big welcome to jkf123!

Sounds like you're going pretty basic (which is fine, of course) with your stocking plans. It seems like the BC's are your only real variation. I'm not known as somebody who knows much about stocking plans, but my own personal opinion is that I love to see ponds that have something unique about them, so we can all learn. My initial impression is that if you limit the BC spawning substrate, that you may be able to angle them out later if necessary. I'd start with fairly low numbers, but I wouldn't let anybody tell me that I couldn't try BC.

Other smarter people will likely chime in at some point.

Again, it's great to have you here.

Bruce

I think it would be interesting to try. I've read they fill a niche similar to a hybrid striper, feeding in open water more than other catfish. They get really big which makes them fun to catch. They would likely take well to feed which could help take some pressure off of your forage base as they grow.

Here's a few blues from Tennessee

One of the better rules wrt pond fish is to learn all you can about the fish you think you want first. The links below should help. The 3rd link is about hybrid catfish (C x B). They have definite pond advantages and hybrid vigor (good traits including easy to catch)) but also outbreeding depression (negative results from their offspring). The link has good info on CC , blues and the crosses for you to consider.If you really want big cats I would consider all male blues in one pond and only a few as a put and take catfish fishery plus the other fish you want.

http://www.cnr.vt.edu/efish/families/bluecat.html efish

http://www.fishbase.org/Summary/SpeciesSummary.php?id=3019 FishBase

Hybrid Catfish SRAC C x B
http://srac.tamu.edu/tmppdfs/381285-190f...67c12d25155482a

Three more with good info.

http://www.grandfishingreport.com/pgs/lakeinfo/species/bluecat/bluecatfish.htm


http://myfwc.com/fishing/Fishes/catfish.html#blue


http://womenanglers.us/Bluecat.html

I'm wondering what all this talk about "trying Blue Cats" is about......

Lots of folks have stocked blue cats and lots of folks still do stock blue cats. Here's what to expect:

1) growth rates similar to that of channel cats...up to 3 lbs per year
2) readily accept floating pellets
3) bite well in cool water when channel cats are slow, and strike aggressively at artificials as well
4) twice the fight as a channel catfish
5) max growth potential in small ponds around 30-40 lbs

Blue cats don't mature until they reach 3-5 years of age, so there's no practical way to sex them at the hatchery, and no need as far as I'm concerned. As long as you stock some bluegill as blue cat forage, the bluegill population will most likely consume any and all blue cat eggs/fry from spawning activity. Don't worry about a blue cat population explosion.

Consider stocking one pond for LMB/BG/RES, and the other with BC/HSB/BG/RES.

Contact me if you'd like to discuss.

I agree with others - it would be interesting to try. From what I have read and discussed with biologist here in Nebraska (and granted what follows is derived from larger ponds and small reservoirs), there aren't measurable differences in recruitment between BC and CC in waters shared with a health LMB population - pretty much nil. So as Bruce suggested, you could angle them out later, if needed.

Additionally, despite the larger size potential of BC, their growth potential isn't being realized in NE reservoirs. Forum observation of a large group of NE anglers over several years, suggests they are rarely caught out of reservoirs at or exceeding 30 inches, and most commonly less than 20 inches. Obviously, there are exceptions. In fact, a would-be state-record Blue was electro-shocked by the Commission in one of our large reservoirs last year. Conversely, and despite their smaller size potential, CC are routinely caught over 30 inches.

The relative small size of BC is likely due to a combination of factors, not the least of which is differences in ease of catch between CC and BC. But, I suspect (and there's no reason to listen to me ) that the BC's "mixed" diet - a mix between dead or dying fish AND live fish - is to blame. They don't specialize so they end up getting out competed on the one end by CC and on the other end by LMB and Crappie. Somehow the niche they so expertly played between CC and Flathead Catfish in rivers, isn't as adaptable to reservoirs.

BUT, new to 2008 in NE is a separation of bag/possession limits for all three species of catfish in NE. CC will stay at a bag of 10 statewide. BC will now be separated and regulated at a bag of 1. Sources tell me there is also interest in creating stocking plans where CC and BC are segregated (i.e. only BC or only CC). This will probably blow my half-cooked theory mentioned above out of the water. Currently, our waters are primarily managed for CC with some reservoirs "throwing in" some BC.

Personally, I think it could be very valuable to manage the ponds as identically as possible with the exception of one intended variable. BC and CC in one and only BC in the other, testing the null hypothesis that the BC growth in both ponds will not be significantly different.

Here is a typical NE Reservoir BC (seen LOTS this size, but only one bigger from this reservoir)


And here is a nice, but not at all uncommon NE Reservoir CC (from the exact same spot as the blue pictured above)

Todd definitely knows his blue cat! The fingerlings I purchased last spring are all 2.5-3# now and pretty much indistinguishable from channels at this point.

The preexisting blues in my ~2acre pond are anywhere from 15-30 pounds now. They are highly piscivorous at the larger sizes-I don't see any over about 20 pounds taking floating feed. At a fairly high density, they will have a major impact on BG and any other forage fish. I'm putting in a whole lot of structure this spring to encourage BG recruitment, continuing to reduce mid-and small sized LMB, and thinking about adding gizzard shad to provide more forage for the blues. Since you're still in the building stage, I would definitely encourage a lot of structure if you're going to go the blue route, or going with really low density stocking. You can always add more, and Todd is a very reliable source of blues if you need them.

Todd because of the size pond and somewhat smaller size of males the idea is to have more BC #s ( example - 10 males vs 4 males and 4 females) before one hits carrying capacity , reduce the max size of fish that the big cats eat (small LMB not the big ones) and avoid any possible reproduction. My experience indicates a fishery much like what Yolk described. One variable I have no experience with is the use of tilapia with big cats. It seems the big blues could help clean up the dead larger tilapia going into winter and not eat as many BG.

Yolk I am very skittish about GShad in a pond unless you have lots of very big LMB or the cats can eat them all prior to spawning. They end up taking up way to much carrying capacity and repress BG and LMB and everything else. They get way to big to fast.

Thoughts or comments ?

GShad pics courtesy Dave Willis

Neb. Chad, what are those cards for in the catfish pictures?

Its for a fishing contest, I've seen them before.

Yep. It was a state-wide catfish contest that ran April 1 - October 31st, 2006.

Which is actually a good point for what I was saying. Winning stringer for BC was: 110 inches (22", 23", 23", 22", 20"). Winning stringer for CC was: 179.5" (35", 35", 37", 37", 35.5).

It's probably just harvest rates or comparative difficulty catching larger BC, but I still wonder if they just don't compete as well in small ponds/reservoirs.

Here's a good pellet fed CC from the contest.


Here's another pellet fed CC from a pit that's probably a little over 10 acres.

I did some checking locally ( SW Ohio) regarding finding some Blue Cats for my pond and was told by all the local fish farms to go to all the paylakes and ask them, I did find several places that would bring them in, but the small ones would be 7-10 lbs range, does anyone know where I could find some fingerlings in the Tri-state area? I had about given up on BC and was going to go with CC but would really like a few BC instead.

I also couldnt find anyone this far north who had ever heard of the hybrid CCXBC catfish.

Good thread, keep the info coming

Salmonid (Mark)

I planted some channel cats last week in a few ponds. Up to this point I had only had one floater of the 600+ panfish I have stocked. So far I have had four cats float.

My fish supplier said that the channels cats are very sensative to oxygen levels in the water and if they begin to turn white they are done for. He also said that they can live for a short time out of water but their gills must stay moist.

Thoughts anyone? Could it be that the cats float more than the panfish and I probable have lost equal numbers of BC,RES and BG that are laying on the pond bottom?

How many cats did you stock vs. the four floaters?

In total 200, 1 died in one of my totes waiting to go to a pond a day later, 2 in my pond, 1 in a friends pond and I don't know if two others had floaters.

So that's a 2% fatality rate, right?

Without knowing more of the details, I wouldn't be to bothered with that.

How big were the cats at stocking?

(I should state that I have close to zero experience with catfish)

7 1/2" to 10 1/2", they were bigger than expected

My BC seem to be doing a good job controlling the GShad. But this might not hold true for everyone. In terms of a sport fish the BC wins without a doubt. However, in terms of table fare, the CC wins.

Thats a dandy fish!! Did you eat that one or not?? do you know how old that fish was? I would love to put threadfin shad intot he pond but am waaay too far north for them to reproduce and GS just get way too big for anything ( except cats like that one) to eat

Salmonid

wahoo!!! It's been about a year since the ponds were completed and I have been pumping water into them since then. The drought has been real bad in central TX. Well this week they might get filled. We are at 3.5" of rain as of this writing with another 2 days of rain to go. It's been a long wait. This was a great day.

We'll keep our fingers crossed for you Jkf. Take some photos and post them, it's free, it's easy, it's low calorie and it keeps us happy. We like the photos.

Has anyone noticed that the bluecats have a lot smaller mouth than compared to a channel cat? The 36#er in the pic I posted last year had a mouth about the size of a 8lb channel...it seemed hard to beleive that fish grew that big eating such little fish.

Sometimes it has to do with growth rate, really fast growing cats will have smaller mouths in relation to their actual body size in my experience...