Building Lake Corona

[dodge man]

It’s been that dry here in western Illinois. We could sure use the rain too.

 

[jk96]

This little guy showed up for a drink today. Finally put a trail camera on the pond a couple days ago. So far a lot of deer, a few coons, and a couple of coyotes.

 

[ponytug]

Pond looks nice, too!
All the best, Peter

 

[BnRidge]

Would like to do bluegill and bass.

We originally did bluegills and some fathead minnows to feed them, 1983. They did ok, then they grew large, then slowly became overpopulated, and were mostly small. Introduced bass fingerlings, 1998. Bass grew fast, very fast, ate every last bluegill, every single one, became very large, then over time they too became overpopulated and small. Now there are only bass, mostly 10-12" or so. 1ac pond 12ft deep, not spring fed.

 

[dieselscout80]

We originally did bluegills and some fathead minnows to feed them, 1983. They did ok, then they grew large, then slowly became overpopulated, and were mostly small. Introduced bass fingerlings, 1998. Bass grew fast, very fast, ate every last bluegill, every single one, became very large, then over time they too became overpopulated and small. Now there are only bass, mostly 10-12" or so. 1ac pond 12ft deep, not spring fed.

I’d bet you have some bluegills left as some of them will get bigger than a bass can eat in a pond that small.

We have a rain fed 1 acre pond like yours that doesn’t have a outflow.

In 2010 we started with 500 bluegills and 250 shellcrackers. Then a year later we got 25 large mouth bass.

Now we still have bluegill and shellcrackers. The bass we catch though are mostly 10” to 12”.

However, I’m sure there are some bigger bass but they are picky about what they eat.

I read a article about growing big bluegills and they stated that you want lots of small skinny bass so the bluegills will grow big.

 

[EddieWalker]

The size of the bass is determined by the size of it's food. If you have too many bass, the bluegill will not live long enough to grow bigger. The pond becomes stunted. The bass continue to reproduce, along with the bluegill, but none of them will grow to any size. One pound bass is about the limit when there are too many bass in a pond.

Rule of thumb is 100 total pounds of predator fish for every surface acre of water. Most people don't fish their ponds hard enough to keep the bass population down. I'm guilty of this. You need to remove every bass you catch. Catch and release if fine for public lakes, but in a private pond, you have to Catch and Remove!!!!

 

[BackRoad]

It's starting to look quite peaceful and inviting Mr. JK...

 

[jk96]

Well I've got two pond threads going now. I thought about including the other here but didn't want to create confusion. 2" soaker rain from midnight last night until now was much needed for our area. I had just put in a new yard stick yesterday. The old one was getting hard to read. We gained just over 3" of water level from this 2" rain. Took a look at the old yard stick and I am down only 2.75" from my high water mark July 31st before this long drought set in so I'm very happy with the loss. My neighbors pond is still down about 18". Water clarity is looking much better now as well. I should have 15lbs of fathead minnows showing up next week to introduce and start prepping for bluegill in the spring. Pond is 4ft where that big stump is in the middle and around 9ft at the dam at the moment. Back to around 4ft to go.

 

[dodge man]

Wish we could get some of that rain here. It’s been raining all day, sort of, less than. 0.05”

 

[jk96]

Wish we could get some of that rain here. It’s been raining all day, sort of, less than. 0.05”

Hope you get it soon. We were in dire need.

 

[jk96]

Fathead minnows arrived today. Stocked the pond with roughly 2,000. They were jumping and darting all over the place when released. Look pretty happy to be out of that small box they were shipped in.

 

[civilian]

I wonder about the cloudiness of the pond water. Do they adapt to that or do they thrive in that? Jon

 

[dieselscout80]

Mine did fine when it was cloudy.

That said as the pond matures it will clear up but the other thing is to add dye to keep algae from getting too thick.

I think straw and or lime will help too.

 

[jk96]

I wonder about the cloudiness of the pond water. Do they adapt to that or do they thrive in that? Jon

Shouldn't affect them at all. They are a river fish adapted to muddy water. Also do well in a low oxygen environment which can be a by product of low visibility in ponds.

 

[EddieWalker]

2,000 will become 20,000 in a year!!!

I released my fathead minnows and copper nose bluegill at the same time. And if I remember correctly, it was this time of the year. Then in Spring when the water temp was warmer and everything had already spawned, I added large mouth bass.

 

[workinonit]

Yea, that's a lot of catfish.

 

[jk96]

2,000 will become 20,000 in a year!!!

I released my fathead minnows and copper nose bluegill at the same time. And if I remember correctly, it was this time of the year. Then in Spring when the water temp was warmer and everything had already spawned, I added large mouth bass.

Will do coppernose bluegill in the Spring and LM bass next fall

 

[jk96]

Yea, that's a lot of catfish.

Just baitfish, no catfish.

 

[workinonit]

 

[EddieWalker]

If you want a pond for fishing, you only want one predator species in there. Usually, it's either bass or catfish. Never put both if you want them to get as big as possible.