Hey all.. My family owns some property in east texas and about 12 years ago we had a 2 acre pond dug and stocked with bluegill and channel cats. I want to say they stocked 500 each but im not sure because i was 7 years old lol. Im thinking about having it stocked with lmb. Ive heard having hybrid bg is no good. How do i tell the difference between a regular and a hybrid bg? Also i want my bass to get nice n fat! should i also stock like shad or fatheads or something along those lines? Thanks yall

Dreamweaver96,

Here are 2 links to really give you a difference in the characteristics between hybrid bluegill and bluegill. Now the there are 2 species of bluegill-native and copper-nose. Copper-nose get bigger, larger, and have deep black-blue coloration and hump when they get large.

http://tpwd.texas.gov/huntwild/wild/species/bgl/
http://www.ksuaquaculture.org/Species/Bluegill,Hybrid.htm

As per your bass IMO: stock heavier on your forage species-bluegill, redear, fatheads for producing large bass. Now the standard 10:1 ratio is normally applied, thinking outside of that ratio will help you get closer to what your looking for. Then comes more outside the box strategies, which now will come all down to goals, budget, and time frame to get where you want to be.

Welcome to this pond forum, dreamweaver96. I also have ponds in East Texas and can offer some tips based on my experiences:

1) Find out what you have first. Fish the pond often and get a feel for the size distribution of the bluegills...all tiny, stunted, all large w/few small ones, or something in between. Same with the channels. In that size pond, it isn't likely that the cats have spawned so I would expect you to catch pretty uniform size cats and likely not really well fed...but fish for them all and find out what you have.

2) Now you can make a plan to turn this pond into something that meets your objectives...which sounds like maybe that would be a pond with some good bass fishing.

3) The more interest you have in bass....the more of those cats you should remove. They compete for the same forage...so before stocking any bass, remove as many of the cats as you can. Not only will they compete for the same forage but the cats can and will eat small bass fry...so before stocking bass, remove cats.

4) Don't believe most of anything that you may have been told about hybrid bluegills. For some reason, many people simply do not think rationally about them. They have a place and fill a need...but a 2 acre bass pond isn't the place for them. They simply do not reproduce enough forage to sustain a good bass fishery. Its really that simple. As a target fish, hybrid bluegills have a lot of merit, but not in a bass pond where forage is your biggest need. You can tell if you have them in your pond by their appearance...they will show markings and mouth size generally of a green sunfish with body of a bluegill. Of course there are exceptions. Post a picture or two and we can id them for sure to determine if you have them or not.

5) Absolutely do not add fatheads or shad until you find out what you have in the pond...and its likely that even after you find out, fatheads will not be efficient. It takes 10 pounds of forage to add 1 pound of weight to a bass. Think about that for a minute...and you can quickly see that it would require a small fortune spent on fatheads to get anywhere. Fatheads are great starting out but are almost never sustained in a pond.

6) A starting point for a 2 acre bass pond with adequate forage would be a stocking rate of up to 200 fingerling bass...but you are not ready for that until you complete steps 1 and 2. Your findings may point to adding more bluegills first....or alternately not adding bluegills. Believe me you are absolutely shooting in the dark until you find out what you have and take steps to correct any undesirable situations...including removal of cats, if you are serious about a bass pond.

Come back and post up your findings, ask questions, and more questions. Do your homework first and you will be glad you did.

Thank yall for the replies! I'll be looking into it this weekend!