Are you an angler who dreams of catching a personal-best bass from your own personal pond? If so, you’ll need to start by creating a healthy pond environment to make those lunker dreams come true. With this in mind, fisheries biologist and Purina AquaMax ambassador Greg Grimes shares the pond management strategies he uses to grow trophy bass. In this Living Rural episode, Greg discusses the role factors like harvesting largemouth bass, bass-per-acre ratio, stunted bass, and relative weight index play in creating world-class fisheries.

Harvesting Largemouth Bass

After thousands of client pond projects, Greg’s concluded most folks have no idea how many bass should be harvested in order to grow the trophy bass they’re after. While it’s great to have a habitat that supports plenty of bass, this could also lead to a bass-crowded environment. In order to sustain really good growth, you’ll need to reverse what biologists call stacking. Stacking occurs when a lack of bass predators leads to an overabundant bass population, which, in turn, leads to stunted bass growth. To mitigate this, Greg suggests simply wetting a line to keep your bass numbers in check.

Healthy Pond Bass-per-Acre Ratio

Greg uses a 20 pounds of bass-per-acre ratio when calculating the number of largemouth his clients should harvest. Ponds holding 40 to 50 pounds of bass per acre are clearly bass crowded, at which points Greg suggests calling friends over to minimize those numbers. While harvesting that many bass be a lot of work, it’s why you stocked your pond in the first place, right?

Stunted Bass

Stunted bass are usually skinnier, Greg says, and are the ones you’ll want to harvest. They don’t have what he calls “shoulders,” and won’t develop the girth your pond’s healthier bass might. 

Relative Weight Index

Greg determines the health of a pond’s bass population based on its relative weight index. Similar to a human’s body mass index, it’s a quantifiable measurement of a bass’ length-to-weight relationship. To illustrate, a 12 ½-inch bass should weigh one pound. If it weighs 3/4 of a pound (12 ounces), this 75% relative weight reflects that it’s a skinny fish. Greg shoots for a 100%-120% relative weight as part of his trophy-bass management program. 

Harvesting Other Species for a Healthy Pond

Your pond might not be yielding a trophy-bass population because of its catfish or crappie numbers, too. Four- to five-pound channel catfish have the same mouth size as a 12-inch bass, which means they’ll be competing for the same prey. If you live further north, pike or muskie are predator fish Greg recommends removing, as well. Finally, he advises against harvesting bluegill, as they’re great meals for spawning bass.

By following Greg’s management strategies, your “so-so” pond will be on its way to becoming the big-bass haven you’ve always dreamed of.

In the first Living Rural episode, fisheries biologist Greg Grimes shared the forage stocking strategies needed to grow trophy bass. While a mix of shad, minnows, crawdads, and rainbow trout are great food sources, bluegills are the real key to a trophy-bass pond habitat.

In this Living Rural episode, Greg explains how to create the optimal bluegill habitat needed to optimize bass growth. Here are his go-to secrets for success.

Pond Habitats are a Numbers Game

If you’d love to grow bigger bass, Greg says you’ll need to show the bluegill some love, too. Having worked with thousands of clients and ponds, one commonality he’s seen is the abundance of bluegill—all bass need to grow big, which means creating the right bluegill habitat.

Greg recommends a 48:1 stocking ratio when first establishing pond habitat. Stocking 2,000 bluegill, 400 shad, and approximately 50 bass fingerlings will prevent ponds three acres and larger from becoming bass dominant. Bass won’t grow big, he says, unless you’ve minimized their competition for food. 

It won’t be long before the bass begin growing—decimating the bluegill population in the process. So, replenish initial bluegill numbers by creating areas conducive for spawning—and growing bigger themselves—to ensure they remain plentiful for bass to gorge on.

Setting up the Spawn 

Regardless of species, all bluegill spawn throughout the summer. Their specific egg production, however, will vary based on the energy needed to build their beds. This is Greg’s key to creating an environment where more of them can survive and thrive. 

Like humans, bluegill want to protect their children. For starters, seeking out places that offer them natural shelter. Greg points out that big rocks, broken concrete, and even fallen trees provide safe havens for their fry needs. If a beaver’s taken down a tree along your pond’s bank line, leave it where it lays. It’ll serve as prime bluegill reproduction habitat, he says.

Creating this protective habitat will maximize bluegill growth rates needed to bulk your bass up. It takes 100 one-inch bluegills to equal the weight of one four-to-five-inches, significantly reducing the energy bass will have to expend feeding on them. When you eventually land that once-in-a-lifetime bass, you’ll have their supersized bluegill buffet to thank!

Using An Artificial Habitat

Greg’s a big believer in supplementing your pond’s natural habitat with artificial habitat, as well. Here are some of the products he recommends:

Safe Haven, Root Wad, and Trophy Tree are MossBack products typically used to help predator fish hide into ambush prey. Each can be placed in shallow-water spawning areas to create additional habitat for bluegill to take cover in.

While Greg acknowledges Christmas trees are time-tested attractants, he also points out that it’ll only be a matter of time before they eventually decompose.

There’s clearly no shortage of artificial habitat options that will help your bluegill population flourish.

Breaking Up The Lake

Greg suggests thinking about your pond in terms of sections and providing the right kind of habitat for each. Namely, habitat for spawning, protection, and travel paths. Bass love to move through uneven areas—like humps, channels, ridges, or ditches—to access places to “loaf” around. For bass, loafing equals growing.

Grass is another natural lake habitat. Ideally, you want to aim for 10-20% grass coverage to create a habitat for bluegill to hide in. Ponds contain more than 20% grass will force bass to expend excess energy they’d otherwise use to grow nice and plump.

Creating optimal bluegill habitat is just one of the smart forage stocking strategies that lead trophy-bass pond management. See what you should be adding to your pond and when you should be adding it here.

The beauty of having your own private pond is the opportunity to catch trophy bass in it. For that to happen, though, knowing how to stock a pond for trophy bass is necessary. Knowing what largemouth bass eat and how many bass per acre is the right ratio will lead to countless hours of fun for you and your family and friends.

To help you grow those trophy-size fish, Backyard Life and our friends at Purina consulted with Greg Grimes, founder of Aquatic Environmental Services. Greg has a Master’s in Fisheries Sciences, making him somewhat of a bass biologist (our words, not his).

In this premiere episode of Exmark’s Living Rural series, Greg breaks down the art of trophy-bass pond stocking:

• Typical Stocking Plan vs. the Stocking Plan Greg Recommends
• Supplemental Stocking Plan
• Forage Stocking Program
• Rainbows vs. Bluegills

Pond Stocking Plan Review

As Greg says, if you want to have nice, healthy bass, you better have plenty for them to eat. For years, the traditional stocking plan used by DNR (Department of Natural Resources) agencies has been a 10:1 ratio. For every 100 largemouth bass you stock, add 800 bluegills and 200 redear sunfish. While that’s a good balance, to grow trophy bass, you’ve got to think in terms of a trophy ratio when you stock a pond.

Greg recommends a ratio of 48:1, which gives the largemouth more to eat. Instead of starting with 100 bass, you’ll start with 50. Then, you’ll come in with 2,000 bluegills and 400 redear sunfish. Not only have you provided more food for your bass to eat, but you’ve also reduced the odds of your pond becoming bass crowded or bass dominant as quickly. This will result in wonderful growth throughout their lifespan. (Not so wonderful for the bluegills’ and sunfishes’ lifespans, but you get the point).

What to Feed Bass in a Pond

Supplemental stocking with fathead minnows is ideal for complementing those higher numbers of bluegill because they quickly build up their numbers. This takes the pressure off the bluegill, and a two-inch bass fingerling can fatten up on the minnows and begin to grow. Eventually, the minnows will be overtaken by the feasting bass, who will switch over and begin dining on the bluegill. Spoil those little guys!

The next allies in growing your trophy bass are crawfish and threadfin to build up a good forage source. Threadfin shad are ideal for ponds three acres and larger. They thrive best in the right environment—one that isn’t too far outside the Southeast mountain region. 

Between the crawfish and shad, you’ve created a climate for superior bass growth throughout their lifespan. If you start to see the bluegill population go down, you need to offset that predation by stocking more bluegill, and that’s where a sound forage stocking program comes in.

Forage Stocking

May is an ideal time to build additional forage. Crawfish prices drop, and are much cheaper to stock by the pound than any other forage fish. Crawfish not only provide sustenance for the bass, but offer the added benefit of stimulating the bite—a nice side note and one that you’ll appreciate later when wetting a line. 

In the summer months, the crawfish are attractive during pre-spawn and into spawning time. This is when the doldrums set in, so add another energy source and break up the summer malaise with some goldfish. While golden shiners are often recommended, Greg says goldfish are better. They’re visible and slower-moving, so bass can easily pick them off. Goldfish offer a bigger bang for the buck, providing the bass with a meatier bite. With the bass exerting less energy, it will lead to better growth rates. 

As winter approaches, rainbow trout’s the call. Greg says there’s no better superfood. You can’t get a better source of nourishment for the bass than the trout. And, their size makes them preferable over bluegill at this point as their main diet.

Rainbows vs. Bluegills

Another key to growing trophy-size largemouth is what Greg refers to as “matching forage sizes.” Rainbow trout are half the length of largemouth at this age, compared to bluegill, which are a third of the length. For a 12-inch bass, you’re trying to push up, stocking these six- to eight-inch rainbows will increase the growth rates on the bigger bass. You can go even larger, stocking 10- to 12-inch trout. Again, your goal is superior largemouth bass growth throughout their lifespan.

Stock your pond Greg’s way from the beginning, add forage throughout the seasons, and be ready for a lot of grinning photos of your friends and family holding some beautiful trophy bass.

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