Frank I thought you wanted quality bass- lots of 3-5 lb bass with occasional 8-10 lb bass, if so I stick with recommendations do not remove bluegill. If trophy as Eric said then you will have few but large bass on most occasions it will not be fun to fish. In this case you do need to remove bluegill b/c a big bass needs big BG not lots of 3-5 inchers. Also needs gizzard shad not tons of 3 inch threadfin, but that is another topic.

BC…Yes bluegill harass LMB beds but Never have I seen them control bass. It is the other way around in most of the ponds we work on. Bass control the population dynamics. Here is an example just from yesterdays shock to see what my rec. are for this case. Most of my clients (90%) want quality bass 85% have too many bass.

LMB (inches)
4-8 - 21
8-10 - 27
10-12 - 18
12-14 - 4
14-18 - 0
>18 - 1
Wr 83%

BG/RE (inches)
<3 - numerous
3-5 - 2
5-7 - 8
7-9 - 9
>9 - 5
Wr 115%

I think BC you might like this for your good BG growth? This pond is 4 acre fertilized (not well) but has no supplement feeding. They want better bass growth but also do like catching some big BG and RES at times. Rec. setup 2 feeders, more consistent fertilization, remove 300 bass less than 12 inches ( 2nd year 200 with attempts to take just males), do not remove BG unless they want an occasional meal, stock threadfin shad add more fish habitats, if budget allows stock 800 intermediate bluegill.

Why.. I think we get way to takeout bass, how I figured number which is nothing more than an approx target goal is 30 lbs/acre divided by average size. Clients want numbers of bass not weights. If he catches out 300 easy I screwed up and needs to take more if he really struggles after 200 maybe a little too high but no biggie.

Why in this case would you remove bluegill, that is the question I guess. I do not see reason why. They are already very limited in scope and the big ones are very healthy as you would expect. Taking them is about the worse thing to do and the reason I jumped on this thread. They will with time replace the intermediate class. In will not take that long if enough bass are removed to speed up process stock more BG.

Again this is diff if you have other goals. Eastland, you say your big bass have low Wr, then yes you might be right about taking some BG, this is more complicated when middle size bass have good Wr and large ones do not. Again are you trying to grow big bass or more numbers of good size bass? I have a few reasons why this is, crappie might have something to do with it. Again if you have lots of 3-5 inch bluegill they are there b/c something is not utilizing them, I would even consider stocking some bass b/f just pulling out BG if bass is goal, again you are probably right harder to diagnosis compared typical client one above.

I hope this better explains my rec. This site is awesome and this shows why general guidelines are just that. You just need to understand your goals and the why of pond mgmt to figure out what you need to do in your case.

Greg Grimes
www.lakework.com