Fish Options and Info needed

[TigerfaninAR]

Just finished having our pond dug. Haven't measured it but I'd guess its about 3/4 acre, about 12 ft deep in spots. Will be building a house there within a year. Have two young boys and can't wait for the fishing. We know we don't want catfish. Bream, bass, black crappie, bluegill, are all very prevelant and have many fisheries to choose from locally. With a small pond like this how limited am I on what species?

Just started a little research and the fathead minnow looks like the common feeder fish to start with and also looks to be beneficial in many ways. I have no real preference. Love catching a bass, bream are fun and easy and kids would love and the crappies is best on the dinner table. Whats my options?

Also what about timeframe from when it fills to when we add the fish? Do we add the feeders first and let them get established?

 

[forester2]

Get the fatheads started and let them breed a couple times before adding predator fish like bass or crappie. My experience is sunfish just 'show up' from eggs transfered by waterfowl from other ponds. But I live in an area with lots of ponds- four on my property alone. Might want to sink some brush in your pond now to give cover to the bait fish.

 

[HeyNow]

Go to Pondboss.com (click Ask the Boss) and you will find out everything you need to know on starting a stocking program and much much more. Great place.

 

[forgeblast]

After helping my neighbor stock his pond after he had it drained and deepened this is what we did.
1. start small...build up the minnows and snails, even some mollusks. If you can let them in there a year like someone mentioned. Dont want to wait a year then just for the next couple of years dump in minnows.
2. read about what type of spawning beds you need. In the winter when the pond was frozen for the first two years i took pea gravel and put it in a circle pattern near the edge a couple of inches deep. when thaw came the gravel falls making nice spawning beds.
3. the plants will come, so will the frogs.
4. so may the snaping turtles, you may want to put in a turtle trap.
5. some bird decoys to keep the geese off of your pond, between them and the blue herons they can eat a pond quick.
6. some people take their christmas trees and put it in a bucket of cement and drop them in the pond for shelter, i dont like this because if the kids are swimming they may get caught up in it....or just do it at one end of the pond.
if you got to different fish hatchery sites you will find similar info.
good luck
http://zettsfishhatchery.com/sitebuildercontent/sitebuilderfiles/CompleteCatalog.pdf
read the last couple of pages.

 

[LRTX1]

Start the fatheads first, then the bream and specks or crappie as y'all call em. After they get established add the bass.

Maintaining the right ratios are tough on a small pond, the bass once started can eat a bunch of bream. Once you have an established bass population you can remove as many males as you can catch. A good way to tell apart is by catching around the spawn, males are typically smaller and their hole will not be swollen and red. Sometimes you can squeze a male and push towards his hole to see the semen come out.

Build your structure before you fill your pond. It doesnt have to be anything special, something that gives shade and ambush points. I've used old boats, stacks of cinder blocks, old culverts. If your structure is casting distance from the banks thats a plus. You can add floats to your structure so you can see where they are later.

 

[firefighter9208]

Here's a good link to a pond guide developed by Auburn University (in Alabama). recreational fishing Fish Pond Management

Question: Why do you not want catfish??? We put 50 catfish in our 1 acre pond after it was constructed. We kept record and when we had caught about 30-40 out we stocked another 150. We've been catching those out.

We also stocked large mouth bass and bream. I think the ratio is 10 bream to each bass. You should stock the bream in the fall and then the bass in the spring.

Bream (sunfish) will lay eggs each full moon during the summer. Shellcracker (hybrid bream) only spawn one time a year.

Catfish won't raise in a pond unless that have a structure to lay their eggs in. Something like a car tire.

Chris

 

[BruceWard]

My Dad built a pond in Arkansas in 2007 and spent quite a bit of time in 2008 stocking it. The levy on this pond is about 400' wide and when full it is over 800' long. He has bream, bass and catfish in this pond. The Game and Fish Commission advised against adding crappie over concern that they would take over the pond.

We have a smaller pond with crappie in it. It is hard to catch anything else but the crappie are plentiful. There was one weekend where my Dad and some out of town relatives caught close to 200 crappie from that pond. A few years later the pond became over populated and a large number of crappie died. It took several years for the crappie to come back. You really have to keep the fished down to avoid over population.

Most of the bass, bream and catfish in the larger pond are spawned from transplanted fish. They were caught in other ponds that had desireable fish and transplanted. Most of the bass are "Florida Largemouth Bass". He transplanted I believe over a thousand bream and bought a thousand or so more. He bought 16 catfish and transplanted a similar number.

I believe the game and fish commission will give you some fish to stock your pond.

Catfish need special areas to spawn. Without them they will not multiply.


This is my 2 year old fishing with her Papa at his largest pond. It is so ripe with bream that she catches one almost every cast.

This is a picture of the pond when it was filling

 

[MarkV]

I will also recommend PondBoss.com as a good place to do some reading. In general crappie are not the best choice for a small pond. They prefer larger bodies of water. Putting minnows and bream in this spring would be good. Let them establish for a year, or at least until Fall, then stock Bass.

MarkV

 

[TigerfaninAR]

Appreciate all the responses. Pondboss is awesome and just like here, a bunch of guys willing to help. The majority say a redear/bluegill/bass combo works pretty good if start with the fatheads. Seems to be debate on the hybrid bluegill and non-hybrid when have the predator bass. We'll see, much more reading to be done.

Had two oaks put in the deepest part and hope to get out tomorrow and get my old christmas tree anchored and possibly get a pvc tree put in by the end of the weekend. Seems I may need some sort of flat surface like pallets for the fatheads (says the experts at pondboss).

 

[nathan812]

In Oklahoma they recommend putting in bluegill, redear, and green sunfish along with catfish (channel cat) first. I know you don't want catfish but you do need something to clean up. After a year or two once the sunfish have been established then you release the eaters (bass) into the pond. Remember the more structure you put in the pond the more fish your pond will support. Fathead minnows are recommended by alot of the fish producers but remember they are in the business of selling fish and fathead minnows are not cheap to keep putting in. On structure you can do a number of things from big cedar trees, pallets(wood or plastic), tires, and the newest thing is a cinder block and poly pipe cut at random lengths then cement them in the two big holes in the cinder block. Good point to these is they don't catch your lures as bad as cedar trees and pallets do. You don't want to put crappie in a pond they are very prone to overpopulation then you get a bunch of palm size fish and nothing else. On structure a good friend of mine that works as a fisheries biologists for the Oklahoma Department of Wildlife says when you think you have enough structure in your pond work another two days on putting more structure in the pond. Sorry for the long post but I have done a little research and know alot of people in the Wildlife Conservation business.