Pacemaker Fishing Forum

I am in need of your all's expert opinions and experience!!! Thanks in advance for reading... I can be a little long winded! Let me know if I missed anything!

Some friends of mine have a farm in Charlotte County VA with 4 ponds. Growing up I spent many weekends at this farm and a lot of my time was focused on these ponds. The fishing was spectacular! One pond would produce 4lb+ bass and smaller bass just about every cast and the other pond would produce Crappie up to about 2lbs.

Well word must have gotten out because these things got poached hard. I was still able to catch bass bc I grew up fishing for bass on Smith Mountain Lake from shore, which is nearly impossible bc of all the fishing pressure and limitations of shore fishing. I still did ok and I have a nice trophy mounted on my wall from there. Anyway... the ponds are no longer much fun and fishing is tough. I fished there two weekends ago and instead of my normal performance, I struggled for about 10 bass just longer than 10" and one about 1.5lbs. I think they are stunted. The crappie are non-existent and were breeding well before they were picked out. I'm worried that since the bass and bluegill have been picked out that the crappie no longer have a food source.

Anyway, long story short - They want to start over or replenish their ponds. Do any of you have any experience with managing a pond? Or do you have any recommended species?

I told them they should restock with largemouth (some in the 4-8" range and some fingerlings), bluegill, crappie (in the deeper pond with trees), some channel cats, a few sterile carp, and possibly some other food source minnow like the fathead or shiner.

Do you think trout could live in a pond that is spring fed and about 22 feet deep? I've never taken water temps there, but I know trout need cold water in the summer. Do you think putting hybrids in to eat the stunted bass would be a good idea to start over - they're sterile so you could always thin them back down.

I don't think Walleye or smallies would be suited to these ponds because they are sand/mud bottom. I guess I should give some background there...

Pond 1 - Maybe 4 acres (I'm not a good judge) and deepest is about 15-17 feet. Has some structure from an old barn and fallen trees. A small creek feeds the pond, seems to be mostly run off from the fields above. Previously stocked with largemouth and bluegill, now contains stunted largemouth and I have not seen a bluegill in years. Main food source- frogs, bugs, and juvenile fish. (the bass here will not take a live crayfish oddly enough)

Pond 2 - Previously a forest, filled with treetops sticking out. Contains crappie, lmb, bluegill, and channel catfish. I have caught very few bluegill lately, only 1 channel cat in the 12 years I've fished there, and very rarely do I catch a crappie there now. Mostly stunted lmb, but they are hard to come by. I used to catch 1 - 2 lb lmb, and up to about 2lb crappie. I believe it is fed by a spring and run off water but the pond stays murky almost coffee like most of the time.

Pond 3 - Largest of the ponds but quite shallow, maybe 8ft at most. Cows destroyed the vegetation in and around the pond years ago and it never recovered. It's full of stunted bass. Run off fed.

Pond 4 - Smallest of the ponds, full of downed trees and is basically just the run off from the larger pond. It was not stocked but contains bass and bluegill. It's actually the healthiest of the ponds right now and I caught a 1.5lb there the other weekend that I released. Used to be a lot of turtles in this pond, not the case now, fish seem to be rebounding. Fed from run off of larger pond, unsure how deep it is, would guess under 8ft.

Ok so that's a lot of stuff for what I meant to be a simple question... Thanks for the help guys!

Pond 1 via google maps (you can see the size relative to the large barn in the picture)


Pond 2 (used to be full of crappie)


Pond 3 & 4 (lots of mud when it rains now that the cows have destroyed the vegetation near the water)

Last edited by Redfish12 (Sep-28-10 5:16PM)