I don't think TP&WD would be interested in "commercially produced" fish, even from Camelot Bell stock. On many levels they'll reject them. First, they could never admit that thier gigantic investments in technology, facilities and personnel were not superior to what might can be done on a small commercial fish hatchery.

Don't get me wrong, I wholeheartedly support TP&WD and thier investments in our state's fisheries. But, I tell 'em like I see 'em, and been working with the Parks and Wildlife folks for over 3 decades.

Second, and more importantly, the TP&WD hatchery system takes a lot of heat from tree huggers. One of the biggest comnplaints by such groups is "genetic pollution" caused by breeding fish in hatcheries and releasing them to the wild. There is merit to the concept, and in response to pressure, TP&WD hatcheries go to lengths to insure that fishes released from thier hatcheries into "wild" environments are "genetically correct" for that area.

Most of the environments that fish from commercial hatcheries are placed in would not be "wild" they would be man made lakes, ponds, and other aquatic contrivances. The savvy hatchery manager breeds his product to thrive and excel in these environments, which is not at all the same as breeding fish for the wild.

The conclusion of such commercial fish breeding, growing, and ultimately fishery development are places like Camelot Bell and fingerlings for sale like those at Overton's.

Thanks for sharing George. I stocked about 4000 of these finglerings into 6 lakes this spring. Some to the lakes were brand new lakes and others had existing populations of bass. I certainly know that most of the fingerling stocked in lakes with an existing bass population will be eaten; but hoping a few survived adding some superior genetic diversity to these lakes.

Steve, I am interested in following your CB stocking program in virgin lakes with no adult predators to contend with.
You have a unique opportunity to contribute as well as unique business opportunity IMO.
G/

We stocked 2500 in a brand new 67 acre lake; but the lake was also stocked with 1500 fingerlings from genetics from Tyler Fish Farms. I have a friend that we both know, who stocked a virgin lake or two with these fish. As you know with the drought and the economy there are not near as many lakes being built these days.

Having different water bodies, especially if new or newly renovated, to evaluate new strains helps a lot. An independent evaluation can be made, and if done in more than one water body, comparisons can be made. This is how I've bred and selected largemouth bass for 30 years, selecting primarily for aggressive behavior and secondarily for large size.

I've done this in reservoirs and my best places for raising bass strains alone have been in local (Houston) golf course ponds. Each spring we gather males and females from these ponds and breed/crossbreed the strains and stock new ponds with those offspring.

I am curious to see how these fish perform in the 67 acre lake and the other ponds. I like the pelvic fin clip method of ID. It will eventually grow back, but will stay recognizable for several seasons. I've tried dye injections under the skin, pit tags in the skull, sonic tags in the body cavity, radioactive isotopes in the inner ear, and even aniline dye in the inner ear, but the pelvic clip seems to be the easiest to do and recognize when fishing.

For larger water bodies, and for long term fishery development, I also stock fish from more than one strain and varied genetics to prevent inbreeding depression, which I've witnessed many times, so far not seen any "outbreeding depression." That might exist, at least with respect to maximum overall size, but my goals have been more along the lines of "easy to catch" rather than "humongous."

We've got fish up to about 15 pounds in my fishing club, but such catches are not the norm. Usually a six or seven pounder is the fish of the day.

I do, right now, not open yet, have a small pond of seven acres that has been built with islands and channels, planted with the proper aquatic plants, stocked with diverse forage, and ONLY female bass ranging in size from 2.5 pounds up to 14.5 pounds. And only 90 of those. Now, if'n all those females were from Camelot Bell....

Bob Waldrop of Tyler fish farms first got me interested in CNBG and pure Florida LMB genetics back around year 2000 when I got too old for big water and got interested in ponds.

Couple of years later, Todd Overton opened his fisheries operation at Buffalo - I believe I was his first customer.
I enjoy their interest as well as you guys in providing high quality LMB and fishing opportunity
Thanks!
G/

Bob and I go back more'n thirty years. We worked together in Crockett a loooong time ago. Nobody had a clue how to produce and use threadfin shad in private bass fisheries before Bob figured most of it out.

I knew the guy that owned the place where Todd is located, before Todd was there. That was in another lifetime for me.

What all us good ole boys calls "Havin' a bass pond," nowadays has a fancy name in the high tech aquaculture world...."ITMA" (Integrated Multi-Trophic Aquaculture). 'Specially those of us what uses some tilapias every year. That means we's raisin' the predator (bass) an' prey (tilapia, bluegill, shad, etc.) together in'a same pond at the same time.

Go figure. Cutting edge aquaculture by a buncha Texas rednecks.

'Course our "harvest" is a bit differnt. The true "harvest" from a bass pond is entertainment, enjoyment, and peace of mind. Then maybe some table fare.