introducing predatory fish to a lake

[Guest Rod&dog]

Hi,, Got a small lake on a farmer mates land. He said im welcome to fish and look after the lake,, It was dug and stocked over 25 years ago, Apparantly there was doulble figured carp in there, Alough i and mates of mine have fished it for years on many different occasions and there seems to be nout but thousands and thousands of tiny roach and it seems there nothing else in there. So i was hoping to controll alot of the smaller fish by introducing a predator such as a pike or 2 to help controll them. and then think about restocking a few nice double figured carp for a bit of decent fishing for the future.

[stealthy1 3,964]

If its full of tiny roach, my first choice would be Perch, that way you dont get bit off every five minutes

[hagar 5]

sounds like a plan , but wont the pike control the carp too and put you back to square one,

how does the small fish affect the carp, im only asking to learn something new atb

[old real tree 92]

perch is your best bet but chub also take fry as bait food......

[kev1986 0]

personally id net the lake if possible and see exactly what is in the lake then id remove all the roach etc and sell to another fisherie etc then if you not to bothered about future breeding of the cap id buy myself a couple of wells catfish about 4lb mark and they will keep the pond in good nick the reason for this is if the pond is full of lil roach etc and yor big carp buy adding a load of perch will up the nitrate, nitrite and the amonia firstly by the extra pressance of fish but if all thses little roach are eaten the perch have to shit them out somewere , i had exactly the same circumstance you are in about 5 years ago and the pond was full of loads of lil bits and pieces like roach and rudd and there was 6 carp all over 10lb mark so i borrowed a net from a local fisherie and netted the lot and removed everything apart from the carp , i then bought 4 wells catfish all around 3-4lb mark and 10 mark simmons strain carp at 6 lb , the mark simmons strain now push about 16lb and the originals are abput 14lb and are real old looking fish so prob be it for them now and the wells wait for it are all pushing 15lb, i also added a few bullrushes and canadian ppond weed but you hae to keep on top it it as it grows like mad ,

 

if you cant net the lake id get a few lads with a couple a pint of maggots and fil ya keepnets up to transfer into big containers but before any of this you must get ea to test water before moving fish to another pond incase you spread disease and wipe out a fisherie best of look mate

kev

[Fishslayer 10]

Consult a local fisheries biologist.

 

A pond that old is likely (well, at least in my part of the world) long past it's prime.

 

I would be inclined to lime it (kill everything) and restock from scratch. It would be a multi-year project with a long delay in payoff but a much more productive lake in the end.

 

Cheers,

Mark

[comanche 3,024]

personally id net the lake if possible and see exactly what is in the lake then id remove all the roach etc and sell to another fisherie etc then if you not to bothered about future breeding of the cap id buy myself a couple of wells catfish about 4lb mark and they will keep the pond in good nick the reason for this is if the pond is full of lil roach etc and yor big carp buy adding a load of perch will up the nitrate, nitrite and the amonia firstly by the extra pressance of fish but if all thses little roach are eaten the perch have to shit them out somewere , i had exactly the same circumstance you are in about 5 years ago and the pond was full of loads of lil bits and pieces like roach and rudd and there was 6 carp all over 10lb mark so i borrowed a net from a local fisherie and netted the lot and removed everything apart from the carp , i then bought 4 wells catfish all around 3-4lb mark and 10 mark simmons strain carp at 6 lb , the mark simmons strain now push about 16lb and the originals are abput 14lb and are real old looking fish so prob be it for them now and the wells wait for it are all pushing 15lb, i also added a few bullrushes and canadian ppond weed but you hae to keep on top it it as it grows like mad ,

 

if you cant net the lake id get a few lads with a couple a pint of maggots and fil ya keepnets up to transfer into big containers but before any of this you must get ea to test water before moving fish to another pond incase you spread disease and wipe out a fisherie best of look mate

kev

Could be wrong but I think Schedules 9 and 14 of the Wildlife and countryside act now forbid the stocking of wels and Water authorities are very much against issuing licences for it .It's a nasty thing to do to a little pond anyway from a conservation point of view.

As I write I have in mind a little chain of farm ponds owned by a friend that I've been lucky enough to fish since I was a spotty kid.. A syndicate held the rights for a while over 30 years ago but overstocked with carp. Without permission at that .Then they dragged out nearly all the weed to make the fishing easier . The frogs went ,the newts went and the damsels went . Luckily the ponds seem to be too cold for the carp to breed regularly and it has reached a point where their numbers have dwindled . The ponds are at last back to their old selves with plenty of tench ,some decent rudd and of course myrads of rudd fry to feed the perch . There are even a few little jacks that never seem to get big enough to cause trouble.

Perch are great for thinning-out large numbers of fry and for a few years will pack on weight and produce some really good fish . Unfortunatly after a few years the perch numbers will probably go up while the size comes down . If you are prepared to put in the work to prevent this by culling and removing the spawn this can be avoided to an extent . On the other hand a couple of pike might do the same job. Initially they'd probably grow like stink but they'd be easy to control as if they got too big they could be relatively easy to catch in a small pond .Pike populations though ,once established in small farm ponds tend to level-out at little more than jack size and rarely grow big enough to threaten decent sized fish of other species and tend not to form large populations as for a start they are quite fond of eating their own youngsters . As said 40% -50% of "weed" is essential for a healthy fishery.

I reckon you are really lucky . By all means pop-in a couple of carp to spice things up but if I had a chance to do what you are doing rather than create just another carp pond I think a I'd go for perch some proper crucians and the classic farm pond fish the tench!. Good luck !

Edited November 23, 2009 by comanche