Sampling (fishing and minnow trap) and observation is still pointing to no BG in the pond. So far I have only found LMB plus assorted newts, turtles, tadpoles and frogs. The toad spawn a few weeks back was impressive!
I'm not ready to finalize the no BG conclusion and will keep looking but want to start thinking about what I could do if that continues to be true.
I'm already culling LMB, would it be productive to add BG in the Fall? If so, what sizes and numbers make the most sense? Seems like adding a variety of BG sizes, to include some larger ones that would be to big for forage for the current LMB population (biggest to date 14") would ultimately add forage for the LMB and add some fishing variety.
If I did add BG I would definitely invest in a automated feeder specifically for the BG.
I'll stop here before I go to much further down this hypothetical path.
Reminder: 2/3 acre pond (mostly 8-11' deep w/some 2-5'), lots of small LMB, already culled ~50 bass with most less 10" or smaller, currently pausing the cull and monitoring.
