Pond Boss Forums MANAGING AN EXISTING POND Evaluating and adjusting fish populations Did my channel cats get eaten?

BG were one of the options and as you mention they are most economical. Also they should provide the largest ultimate size LMB. You are putting in a good fishing effort and if you will continue this you should see good improvement in the size of the LMB. If you succeed in thinning the LMB to consistently grow them to over 3 lbs then you will likely see the growth of the BG decline and their numbers increase. In the beginning you should see very good growth for both species. Right now, the bow is way below its carrying capacity (excluding the CC) and you should see a good response for both LMB and BG.

The other option might have been annual introduction of adult golden shiner say 10 to 20 lbs per acre and timed for water temps breaking 60F. The shiners probably won't be able to get established sufficiently to overwinter but they should be able to breed and produce many offspring that would substantially supplement the forage for the LMB. In this case you would produce a lot more weight of LMB annually and continue to have high LMB reproduction. You might only choose this if don't mind LMB < 15" but like large numbers of them for catching and eating. Shiners would produce a larger standing weight of LMB, larger numbers of LMB, and LMB of smaller size (than with BG). This wouldn't however be better if that isn't what you want. With two BOWs you could have set up both provided the lower BOW was the one with BG. This might have also allowed you move male BG to the upper bow (say 10 per annum) which growth would be stellar.

As an aside, now that you have BG reproducing, I would be reluctant to add the Golden Shiner if large BG are desired further down the road. If this isn't a priority they should help you in combination with the BG to grow larger bass. You could use the planned forage pond to grow shiners. The benefit would be that they will more successfully reproduce and grow much larger than FHM.