Pond Boss Forums INTRO Questions & Observations Learned something about LMB

I am also a bit confused about the genetics and also about their reports of the growth rates of male LMB as well as the impressive final weights achieved by their relatively young LMB.

It does not match what I have read in many other publications or what the experts on Pond Boss generally observe. Perhaps we all suffer from confirmation bias and just assume the large LMB we observe are females - without ever properly sexing the fish.

It will be fun to watch this hatchery/raising crew for the next few years and see what they can produce for Kansas.

Does the facility you visited allow public tours? If so, which facility?

My kids like to tour these types of facilities, but only if I promise not to embarrass them! I have inadvertently broken my promise more than once.

Kenny,
Great information! I do think genetics play a role, but not nearly as strong a role as a thousand pounds of koi in a hatchery pond. Without food, genetics aren't relevant for the end gain growth into some special sizes. Food plays a huge role. I've watched bass with "great" genetics never reach their purported potential because they didn't have all the other elements of what I call "happy water", great habitat...and plenty of food.

One more question to ask the hatchery guys...when they put those male bass back into the hatchery pond to feed them for next year, and if most of them are similar sizes, what will they look like next year? I'll bet supper there will be a percentage that exhibit rapid growth, different body confirmation, and seriously heavier weights than the rest of the fish...unless they have topped out at that size (which is influenced by genetics). Further, I'll bet there will be another percentage that grew a little bit, even though their relative weights may still be off the charts. And, there will be a percentage that don't grow much at all. If what I'm suggesting is true, I'd like to know how they handle those fish...do they use all of them to breed with the girls, or do they select and pair some of their fish based on size?

Great questions, Kenny! Another factor for those bass larger-than-normal male sizes is they don't expend much energy to feed, or to reproduce. At a hatchery, they want baby fish to be as uniform-sized as possible. To do that, they control their spawns, hatch as many as they can during a finite period and growth them just large enough to stock before they become too cannibalistic.

But, genetic talk aside, there's no way those big boys could grow so large if they didn't have a 24-hr cafeteria open. All they have to do is turn, open their mouth, and suck. Food!

Think it would be worth experimenting with a Koi/LMB pond?

I have read that Koi spawn at roughly 65-70F. That should make them the latest spawning fish in most ponds. Wouldn't that make Koi recruitment very low, since everything else in the pond would be eating the fry?

If you used grow out ponds for raising the Koi, and pushed them out into the LMB main pond while they were optimal eating size, would it be possible for all Koi to be consumed in a 1-year interval so you never reached the problem of very large Koi that are too large for predation?

It sounds like feed > Koi > LMB is more efficient at growing large LMB than just pellet feeding the LMB directly. If so, would utilizing the Koi make it worth the effort and extra man-hours? (Depending upon the goals for your LMB pond.)

Kenny, you hit the nail right on the head about being able to learn from them. There is absolutely no place TO learn that information except hands on learning.

I talked to a hatchery in Mo. that raises catfish. She said that the farm manager left in January and she cannot find anyone to take his place.Not a lot of hatcheries in the area, so the knowledge pool is tiny. She didn't know if she would even open up this year, she said if she can't find someone to hire pretty soon she'd put the hatchery on the market, and if it didn't sell pretty quick, she'd just shut it down.

THAT would be a shame.

Is there any way she could put a "help wanted" ad into Pond Boss forum or magazine?

That is connecting to a pretty diverse network of people with a great interest in raising fish. Even if no PB member is a fit, they might know a person with the skills and desire to take that job.

Maybe. I'll get ahold of Bob and see if he can call her. She sounded really depressed and bummed out about the whole mess.

I've been reading the old stuff methodically for last 2 years , my wife thinks I've lost my mind . This thread really caught my attention.
By accident I saw this in practice , in the field. When I bought my farm it had a 1/4 acre mud hole. When previous owner bought it , it was a mono-species pond. BG's and BG stunted by the hundreds . . Then a lady in town offered him 15 KOI that had out grown her backyard pond and it was over run with Koi. he placed Koi in the 1/4 Acre pond. Then his brother showed up with 2 10-12" LMB , 1 BC and 1 FHC about 10" each , caught in a local lake. Then 3 years later I bought the farm and a year later dug out the pond to nearly 2 acres , decided on SMB and therefore used Rotenone . As we cleared out the dead fish, there were 15 KOI , zero fingerling KOI , just the original stocked KOI + a 10 lb + FHC, a BC that was pushing 10+ , 2 football shaped bass , 5-6 lbs each, I had seen the 2 Bass the previous spring , both had built nests and were swimming around their nests like they were waiting for a female.. The BG numbers were down according to the previous owner , but we still netted out 3-4 hundred. I'm thinking the 2 LMB were males, big males. These 15 KOI had bred until they bred themselves out of a home, but not an additional KOI in my pond. Is it reasonable to assume that the serious growth of the 4 predators was from consuming small , energy dense KOI ? Would it also be reasonable for those attempting to grow Trophy Bass , to remove BG from forage pond , grow KOI, and stock at appropriate sizes to match the LMB gape , KOI fingerling and larger ? I see this as a little more labor intensive , you don't want large KOI over running your pond. Net out appropriate #'s of KOI each week , remove tails and fins and stock. As feed size gets too close to spawning size , tail and fins and carefully open the gut without organ damage and release for your LMB to enjoy, while assuring they don't live long enough to spawn in your Trophy pond. Just an outside the box thought, maybe way outside the box , but thought I would throw it out there. It may not be necessary to split the gut if you have really aggressive LMB , and your a couple months from next KOI spawn. Or maybe not necessary to take time to remove tails and fins if you carefully split the gut. Thoughts ?

Just to be sure, did you see Koi recruits? Say into the 2" and larger sizes? Sometimes Carp(Koi) do not reproduce well above a certain density.

Odd as this may sound, sounds like a very well managed 1/4 acre pond for trophy predators. Check this out. Predators weighed around 21 lbs and so it carried 84 lbs/acre of predators. If you count the 10 lb FHC as two 5 lb bass it just makes sense. A predator density of 16 LMB/acre in a pond carrying 84 lbs of LMB ... the average LMB would be ~ 5.25 lbs. Pretty interesting it also applies to male LMB.

If you didn't see many YOY carp, they may not have spawned well. It is possible that BG supported the predators. BG can themselves support 84 lbs/acre of LMB. That said, if YOY Koi were produced, they surely contributed. FWIW, Carp (Koi) are very good food and the best I can tell, live Carp are as energy dense in digestible energy as most high protein feeds. I don't see why you couldn't feed injured Koi or even incorporate some Koi chunks when feeding hand throw.

Not one carp colored carp, not one koi colored carp. From my reading of pages after pages of the forum, members growing BG to supplement forage for their trophy ponds, I was struck by this thread started by snipe , that maybe Koi would be much better than BG in these forage ponds. Especially when I realized , I had by serendipity , been able to see it played out in the mud hole I had bought. Just throwing the idea out there. Wish I had a couple of forage ponds , I would love to see what they might do, for my SMB and WAE.

If you are able to work out all the wrinkles, (construction, water source, collection), a forage pond would be a positive. All forage is good and it doesn't have to be as energy dense as carp (koi) to make a profound influence.

That pond was producing at least 400 or so lbs of BG equivalent (energy content) forage to the acre. That is exceptionally good in situ production. To go beyond requires supplementation. I think GSH are also good choice for forage ponds, especially yours with SMB and walleye. You can have fry delivered to your door and get as much as 70% survival in a forage pond where they can be between 1" and 1.75" in length in less than 10 weeks depending on density and feeding. So at 1" they count around 5000 to the lb. At 70% survival of 250K fry that would be 35 lbs of forage. A 1/10 acre is big enough to do it. 35 lbs doesn't sound like a lot but at 1" they are just getting large enough to be a challenge for BG to subdue and they will contribute WAY more than 35 lbs of forage (how much depends of many factors to include food and predators) but more than the 35 lbs several times over at a minimum if your predators aren't excessive in numbers.

Yes , Love my GSH . ponds are full of them . Quit catching 5-9" on artificial lures and seeing 1-2"ers pushing optimal all around , I'll be calling Andersons.

Forage ponds are a good idea but require some work. Several articles in PB mag over the years on the subject. When choosing forage species many options /choices and goals are involved. Keep in mind that in the example above the forage had a big head start on the predators. In one example I have seen a 5-acre BG forage pond with lots of fed BG became almost devoid of BG after someone secretly added a few smallish FHC. When drained several years later (apx. as no one was sure when the FHC were actually stocked) it had about 300 BG and 3 FHC - one 30 lbs , one 20 lbs and one 17 lbs.

We think of LMB as the apex predator in U.S. ponds, capable of consuming vast amounts of forage fish.

I think flathead catfish are the real apex predator!

That 30# FHC might be capable of eating a 10# LMB.

From a prior thread on FHC;

North American Journal of Fisheries Management
Article: pp. 198�202

Gape:Body Size Relationship of Flathead Catfish
Joe E. Slaughter IVa,,1 and Brad Jacobsonb
a) Georgia Department of Natural Resources, Wildlife Resources Division, 2065 U.S. Highway 278 SE, Social Circle, Georgia 30025, USA
b) Arizona Game and Fish Department, Region IV, 9140 East 28th Street, Yuma, Arizona 85365, USA

Abstract.

The flathead catfish Pylodictis olivaris is a highly piscivorous ictalurid native to central North America whose range has been extended throughout much of the United States. With this range expansion, many populations of native fishes have experienced declines in the number of individuals due to direct predation by flathead catfish. Previous evidence suggests that flathead catfish are opportunistic feeders and may be the least gape limited of North American freshwater piscivores. To better understand the size of prey vulnerable to flathead catfish, we measured gape dimensions for individuals of various sizes to determine the maximum size prey a flathead catfish can kill based on its gape limitations. Our results show the relationship of total length to horizontal and vertical gape and the relationship of flathead catfish total length to the total lengths of ingestible-sized prey of different body shapes. Furthermore, comparisons of the body depth of three common fish species to the gape dimensions showed that no size of largemouth bass Micropterus salmoides, bluegill Lepomis macrochirus, or gizzard shad Dorosoma cepedianum would preclude predation by flathead catfish. Our results support the assumption that the flathead catfish is one of the least gape-limited piscivores.

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Bob Lusk
Editor, Pond Boss Magazine
Lunker

Registered: 10/04/02
Posts: 3121
Loc: Whitesboro, Texas
(71.29.194.5)
Flathead catfish not only eat other fish, as they grow large, they kill for the sake of killing, whether they eat the fish or not. Once they define a territory, they defend it. I'd steer clear of that situation and choose a better tool.
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