Pond Boss Forums MANAGING AN EXISTING POND Feeding Are my shiners getting to big for my pond?

In the last year or two i have been taking my unused Golden shiners and dumping them in my pond, as food for my bass. The problem is the biggest bass (plural) in my pond are about 14 to 16 inches. while the shiners are growing to aboat 6 to 7 inches, and ther growth rate is increasing very dramatically. One last thing is why are some of the shiners Silver and the others are golden colored. Please give responses

JD,

Some others with more knowledge than me can chime in here, but having some adult shiners that are temporarily above forage size will produce more forage for your bass by spawning. Even the adult shiners will eventually become forage as the bass get larger. On the negative side, there have been posts indicating that goldies are known egg eaters (so are many other fish). I'll be interested to see other posts on this topic as I have not introduced goldens to my pond but am considering doing so.

JD, often the larger ones are golden colored, and the younger ones are silver...is this what you're seeing ? As for "if" you have a problem...probably not, but it would help if you said your pond was 4 acres, and the relative weight of your bass was 1.10% Certainly 100's of 7 inchers in a small pond are a problem, while a handful are probably fine. As a general rule, if your bass are plentiful and fat, be thankful. While shiners do eat eggs, they would have to be heavily populated to do some damage...those big bass guarding the nests are a blast to watch, you have to have a LOT to be concerned.

Do you subscribe to the magazine? The article about gizzard shad says that a bass can eat a slender fish almost half its length. Unless there are a lot of them, I wouldn't be concerned.

My forage fish are larger than my game fish. We have been catching shiners like theses on small hooks with breadballs. Picture attached, (if this works right) trophy shiners

Click on the word, "trophy shiners" in my previous message- hopefully the link works.

LOL, That is one big Shiner!