Pond Boss Forums STOCKING A NEW POND Types of fish to choose New Pond in NW KS. (The end of..)

Sure am glad to hear that your dam held up! Whew!

It has been a funky year for rainfall. Here in central Iowa, May got 13 inches (normal is 5), June got 9 ( normal is 4.5), July was typical (4) and August was dry....until 4 days ago, when we got 4 inches in one shot, and 2 more 48 hrs later. My pond had evaporated down as expected during the dry July and Aug weather, but she's topped up again now! I had the 'iced coffee' colored water for 2 months (May and June) and it's back to that again. Main positive from this colored water was the effect on my FA. My pond has the least FA we've seen in the past 4 years. We have kept using pond dye this summer, once the water cleared up and spot sprayed and raked.

I am hoping that you kept more of your mature fish than you know. I know electro surveys can be a bit pricey, but maybe it would be helpful in developing the management plan going forward? I am likely going to get one next spring, to see now my 2017 stockers are progressing.

I work directly with KDWP so if I want to shock, I put the shocker boat on and just do it..:-))
Temps are still up at a point I don't like to handle fish if possible but when it gets down to upper 60's this is an option.
Our highs are forecasted in the mid 70's next week with lows into upper 40's so that may happen sooner than I thought.

I’ve been watching this last round of storms down there. Hoping a couple of those big rains slid east of you.

We had another 1.5 2 nights ago but missed the big stuff.
Pond did come up about 6" but that's normal. I don't see much for rain in extended forecast but highs in the low 70's and low's down in the 40's forecasted so not sure how my tilapia will fair. I don't think I'm going to need to worry about FA again this year, water was 72 yesterday evening..

Kansas has taking a beating this year with all the massive rains. Hopefully you will have a good turn out and not have lost many. Good luck I hoping for a mild winter myself.

The big rains missed us again today. Not a drop fell here. Low ponds. We did get enough small rains last week to re-green the hayfield and lawns that were browning. We have not had any rain with run-off since June 24. Some places relatively nearby have had over 6 inches in the past two weeks. The weather site I belong to acknowledged we could be in a rain shadow.

If it starts to sprinkle here they put up flash food warnings. The ground has been pretty soaked all summer. No where for the water to go. I have a small creek in my backyard. It normally is dry most of the year. It has had running water for months now.

This is the creek that for most of the year is dry. This year it has been from 3 inches to 4 feet deep and never been dry.

Had my first day of Fall sample 2019 today. Set Trap net last night and run 277 fish across measure board and scale today. Was interesting to see so many fish, almost too many for myself to handle.
Had some YP of all sizes present from about 3.5-14".. WR's ave about 98. High on smaller fish, a bit low on the 10"+ size.
Got a surprise of a 13-3/4" SMB that was 107% and several smaller.. SMB ave is well over 100% so looks good there.
Some real good Male BG averaging slightly above 100% WR and RES with some decent growth but the larger they are the lower the WR so not as many as I had hoped utilizing pellets.
Took 3 BCP out that were accidental stockings last year. They made it to 12-13" in that year and those minnow eating machines are in the freezer now. Got 1 Saugeye at 18-1/2" and above 110% WR. Lots of YOY RES, YP and SMB with 2 6" GSH and hundreds of crawdads.
WT 58 and falling, low of 34 forecasted for tonight.
I can see after 1 sample that my larger forage items are lacking, the larger the fish, the lower the WR with exception of SMB.
I've removed several hundred YOY YP and can tell I haven't dented the population but those guys are denting my FHM's. I believe I need to be more aggressive on removing mid-size perch as well. Part of this may be from the flood and loosing most of my vegetation.
6 nights to go so prelim here, just thinking out loud.

What type of trap setup do you use?

Fyke nets roundy. I have a 4'X 5' alum frame Fyke with 30' lead net I really like for the small pond stuff, much easier to handle than our larger, steel-frame fykes.

Those are some serious setups! When I was younger I run hoop nets and catfish baskets in the river. I always assumed you needed a bit of current for the hoop to work. Guess that is what the feeder wings are for. Thanks for the info.

Wow, that's great info. This is going to be so informative for me to follow. Thanks for all of the work and time that allows us all to learn.

Interesting you had luck catching SMB in the fyke net. I've had my fyke out dozens of times and have yet to catch a SMB.

C, that's how it was for me last fall at my pond. We have similar results with SMB in large impoundments/Lakes. SMB seem to be pretty sly and in observations it's been noted how unique their behavior really is, smart fish.
I got a pretty decent mix of SMB today, #'s still ave. above 100 WR so I'm impressed with my Smallies overall.
YP is Mixed in WR's, I got a 14.5" today that figured out to 106 WR, yet most of my YP above 10" are 95-96 ave.
BG look good, RES aren't looking the best, ave WR is 92 after 80+ fish in 2 days. Something missing for them to do well, just not sure what.
I did notice something today after folding up nets after drying.. I decided to take my 3' fry net and buzz the shoreline. Lots of minners from fry to 3" but noticed most are shiners.. had to look "real hard" to find an actual FHM. Also found high numbers of RES from 1/2" up to 2".
I'll run the full 7 nights but I think I can plainly see a trend..
ps, ice on the top of a bucket this am...ooooooh!
WT 56

You don't suppose the RES struggling is due to your tilapia reducing the FA do you? Seems RES always thrive in environments when there is an abundance of vegetation and/or FA.

I think the RES are struggling in Snipe's pond likely due to too much competition with BG and YP for natural food items. I assume his RES are not pellet trained and this means the adult RES have to survive on natural foods. As evolved, RES are best or well adapted to eat small mollusks and when these items are scarce the RES are not real competitive with other better adapted invertebrate predators.

I believe there is merit to both comments and it looks like the easiest fix is to remove all of the BG I can. I stocked only males but I've also lost nearly all of my vegetation due to the flood, which with it went billions of aquatic invertebrates and I have no foodmart left.
I'm planning to remove about 75 6-7" YP and all of the BG I net, here on out. It's a large move but one I feel is needed due to the lack of supporting vegetation, hence other more abundant foods no longer available.

You don't think the vegetation will return in short order? I was presuming most of that would return next year, but have no idea.

BTW, I love the single sex BG plan. That's gonna be fun to watch.

Flood was Aug 10th I think.. I had hoped some veg would show back up but never has. I'm sure that has to make an impact on forage base, nowhere to hide, nothing left to reproduce FHM-wise. I did get some fry yesterday that was 1/4-5/16" I brought home to try and identify-I can't for sure but I believe they are Shiners and am guessing a week or less old, so could be FHM-possibly.
Day 3 in the bag.. Pretty much the same as 1-2 but 75% of the fish today were YP-166 to be exact with 1 oddball RESXBG-but 8.5".
Using 3 tanks for this, 1 for electrolytes, 1 for salt dip and 1 with fresh water before return to pond. This is a 2-man operation with this many fish, gotta find some help!

Thinking out loud here, one of the things I was looking forward to this sample season was collecting some recruits from the Tilapia. I've caught 3-4 between 2-3" and 21 about 1/2" (1/2" in fry net). Not seeing what I thought I would there. I was going to hold some over winter inside but maybe they've been preyed upon heavily??

Interesting on the tilapia. What’s your water temp? Maybe tilapia are fyke net savvy?

I think they are fairly savvy..I've watched them walk with a pectoral fin on their side in an inch of water to get to an algae patch.
WT 54.

Bill, is it possible to have a lower number of male only BG with RES and establish more normal growth rates with a slightly more aggressive culling of YP once my vegetation reestablishes?
Or would it be smart to pull all BG possible, continue the plan to cull quite a few 5-7 YP and see how that turns out-if anything changes with RES.
WWBCD?

Kenny I'd harvest every single BG you can manage, weather permitting, all year long. Seining, trapping, angling...either than or drain, seine, remove your desirable species, lime nuke and refill. Provided you have a way to fill the pond, you'd really only need to move your fish for a couple weeks.

I stocked about 70 male only BG early this summer so I'd think I would stand a chance of removing most. I have already removed 31 in the last 2 days. I pulled 43 5-7" YP today as well.
I'll see how many BG I get in the next 4 days and report.