12 acre pond, deepest is about 12’ (normal pool). Fishing has declined over the past several years. They’ve gotten smaller on average and there seem to be a ton of them 10” or smaller. Should I start throwing the smaller bass out? We have crappie, bluegill, bass and catfish. No carp.

Eat them all until they get hard to catch. That will teach them.

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I always think about biomass in these situations. If a lake will support 100 5 lb bass it alternatively will support 500 1 lb bass but not both. This applies to every animal in every environment. So your answer is to increase size by decreasing population. I hope you can have the help and time to get rid of a lot of your fish population.

I agree with this. Start taking them out. Buzzards and coons gotta eat to

Thanks. I’ll start culling the small bass in 2 weeks. And a mess of crappie!

Organize a kids fishing event and let them keep all they catch.

One day donation to a kids charity.

Are we talking fat and healthy ten inches or skinny malnourished ten inches? If they're skinny there are only two ways to resolve the problem and that is to increase the forage fish or decrease the predator fish.

Take a lot of the smaller Bass out first.

Increase forage!


If I’ve learned anything from fishing private lakes, you can support a substantial population of big Bass if you provide threadfin shad on a yearly basis.

That’s a good suggestion. We’ve thought about adding shad and crawfish.

Been trying to deal with this at the deer lease. There is a pond of similar size there. At one time four pounders were regular. Now the average bass is a pound and a half. I pulled about a 100 out this year. Not sure if its a dent in the population.

This is most likely your best bet. I am not a pond owner myself, but I have been yelled at by a few.....

If your goal is to increase the average bass size:

Double gill every bass caught 12inches and under and release them in the deepest part of the lake.
You are converting the smallest predators into forage/prey for the largest predators.

I’d also keep or double gill every crappie longer than 10 inches.
You are removing the largest prey that consume the most biomass.

I sense a few meals of succulent baby bass coming !

I would also drop some brush piles in 6-10 fow at the end of points, middle of funnels and ditches leading to spawning areas, creek channel bends, humps/saddles, etc/etc.