Pond Boss Forums STOCKING A NEW POND Types of fish to choose 1 acre pond stocking

I built a 1 acre pond southwest of Houston, Texas about an hour near El Campo. The pond is 10ft deep at the deepest part with a peninsula that divides the main pond from a flat that is about 3 foot deep. During construction we placed about 20 cedar trees total in two different areas standing up for cover throughout the water column along with eight 12" and 15" dia x 4'-0" concrete culverts. My goal is to provide a fun pond for my family to enjoy with the focus mainly on a sustainable large bluegill fisherie. We stocked 4000 fathead minnows, 1000, golden shiners, 400 coppernose bluegills, 100 redear sunfish, and 100 hybrid bluegill this week as the pond reached about 80% capacity about a month ago.(Currently dealing with a fish dieoff of minnows that I posted about under Help) I plan on adding 100 large mouth bass in late May. My question concerning fish stocking first is catfish. Is putting catfish a mistake? Will it have any negative effects on the bluegill / bass population and gerneral size? As far as species, what is the best to stock if I do decide to add them to my pond? I have always prefered channel catfish over bluecats personally but I only want to do what would be best for my pond. This being said, Henneke fish farm, the hatchery I have been using, has hybird catfish that are bred using the female channel catfish and the mail bluecat. They are supposed to be very efficient in gaining weight. The hybrid does not reproduce so they would need to be restocked periodically. Does anyone have any experience with the hybrid? My second question is bass. Is 100 a good number? If catfish are introduced should the number be adjusted? Finally the third question is was putting the hybrid bluegill in a mistak? My initial thought from information I found is that since they produce 90% male fish and that they do not spawn heavily it would help with the average size of the bluegill population. I have been told that they will cross breed with the coppernose as well and that would also help with possibility of growing large bluegill. After I stocked them I found other articles that address the problem of the hybrids reverting back to the green sunfish over time. Should I be concerened?

If you are concentrating on large BG and plan on feeding fish food, Cats will likely eat fish feed you would rather have the BG getting. In doing so, they quickly reach a size that will have you fishing with tackle you may consider larger than optimum for catching BG. Both of these points are negative IMHO, the first especially so.

I have no BC or hybrid Cat experience and will pass on these issues.

100 LMB would give you a 5:1 (reproducing) bream:bass ratio. IIRC that is generally considered bass heavy stocking down Texas way. If you were up North I would advise going with 200 LMB, and I suggest you consider it anyway based on more Southern responses to the question.

I would not have bothered stocking any HBG along with the Coppernose, but I do not consider it a huge mistake. Under proper big bream management, the HBG will outgrow the CNBG for maybe a year (maybe not at all). My experience with stocking both hybrids and regular BG was that the HBG were a non-entity after a couple of years. Go ahead and remove the HBG and enjoy eating them as soon as they reach what you consider to be harvestable size. I suspect that after the first CNBG spawn grow a little, you will see a hybrid rarely if ever.

If you manage bass-heavy, any HBG offspring that are more GSF-like will be preferred bass forage. Not to worry on that front.