Your going to eat bass?
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With the unique nature of the lake with crystal clear deep water and a gravel/rock bottom we decided to not go the traditional largemouth bass route for stocking.
We wanted something very unique so after talking with several fisheries biologists we decided to stock smallmouth bass.
The problem is smallmouth and largemouth don't mix well in small lakes. The LMBs are much more prolific and prevent the SMBs spawn from being successful. Eventually the LMBs take over and in a few years the SMBs will become less and less.
So our solution will be to have a SMB brood pond on site to help supplement them and cull every LMB that we catch.
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Finding a source for SMB within 500 miles was not easy. I finally found a good source and had them trucked here in Dec.
It was a good day to see them finally arrive after 8 months of waiting for them to get big enough!
We ended up stocking 650 5-7inch fish and 70 10-11inch fish. We had zero loss during transport. I'm sure we lost quite a few to the LMB that are left...but we tried to mitigate this by stocking another 18K shiners a few hours before the SMB arrived.
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Our goal is to grow record class smallmouth here in a private fishery in TX. That means pouring the food to them and culling LMBs.
We were wondering how long it would take to catch one and were thrilled when the first one chomped a craw worm.
We've started catching a few every trip out.
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The smart thing to do would have been to do an electro-survey too see how many LMB's we had left....but no-one ever accused me of being smart.
Also I'm cheap when it comes to things like that. I would rather spend that money on forage fish, building a brood pond, and have fun catching and eating them rather than watch the LMB's come floating up shocked to a net.
We catch fewer and fewer LMB every trip out so we think we are making a decent dent in them. But with the spawn coming up they will just resupply.
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Originally posted by jerp View PostGreat looking place! You know, I used to dream about owning a large property to hunt on. As I have gotten older I now think I would prefer much less acreage but with lake on it. I never get tired of being on/around the water.
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Originally posted by 1longshot View PostHave you caught any crappie in your ponds? Just wondering if they would do well in them.
Since SMB's obviously have a smaller mouth then LMB the food they eat is different than LMBs. Bluegill get too big for SMB to eat pretty quickly so that's why we stocked golden shiners and will stock threadfins here shortly. SMB prefer soft-finned fish to eat and of course they love crawfish.
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That's interesting about the stocking of smallmouths Steve. Never would have thought of that. Any certain reason,other than the water being like it is? SM fight better ??
Good luck on it all. I know you can do it,because we all watched you develop your last place with plots. You taught us all a lot about doing food plots & we Thank You!
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Originally posted by DUKFVR View PostThat's interesting about the stocking of smallmouths Steve. Never would have thought of that. Any certain reason,other than the water being like it is? SM fight better ??
Good luck on it all. I know you can do it,because we all watched you develop your last place with plots. You taught us all a lot about doing food plots & we Thank You!
So far they are fat and putting on some weight. We did have some water turkeys fly in there in January so we aren't sure how many we lost to them....but we think we are in good shape. We did notice some fish with scars on them from the birds.
I'm hoping the biggest stockers will be 15 inches by this fall and have some 20 inchers by the fall of 2022. That would be a 4.5 - 5 lb fish. The small stockers should be 9-10 inches by this fall and are a year behind the big ones.
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