Printable View
If you have a 5 1/2 acre pond how many grass carp? I've heard 15 an acre and I've heard 20 an acre. I purchased 40 the other day and also wondering how long before they start munching away. Should I wait a couple of weeks before poisoning the lily pads? Thanks
man that is a lot, them things will go nuts and eat everything is site, I put four in a 1 acre pond and they destroyed the pond , ate every green thing in sight,,,, finally got them out and two years later things are getting back to normal.... hope you come out better.... by the way they smoked up nice on the smoker....
LOL! so you smoked them?! LOL! I'll pass on that, I had smoked gar before and boy was it n..a..s..t..y! Beagle Man did they eat your Lily pads too?
they ate every single piece of green, all of it. so Yes they did....
Beagle did that ruin your smoker??????
dfar nope, but the cats won't come around anymore
Same here. Be careful. We had a 55 acre HOA lake south of KC. Fishing paradise in the metro. Some moron didn't like the grasses, convinsed them to dump a bunch of grass carp in here. We used to catch huge red ear, fat fighting, flittable red ear. They are starving. Bass used to be good game. Now, look they are starving. Grass carp are 4-6' long...yes... FEET LONG and rule the lake. We caught one just shy of 50#. Lake is ruined. I haven't fished it like I used to for years.
Gordon you need to take up bowfishing for them carp. It is a lot of fun once you figure out how far to aim below the fish.......
We normally recommend 1 to 2 grass carp per acre to start. The guy selling you carp will recommend more. As they grow, they eat more and more. If you stock at too high of a rate, they eat all the vegetation, begin rooting around in the bottom for food, stir up the sediment, and turn a pond into a mud hole (underwater pigs). We also recommend 20-30% of vegetation coverage around a shoreline. Fish need vegetation to feed, grow, spawn, hide, etc.
Well lily pads of course but a lot and I mean a lot of that watershield. I would say about a 1/3 of the pond has watershield and it's so thick. That's what I hoping they will eat. Also a little bladderwort.
Be careful what you wish for. Growing up, we had a 4 acre pond that always had weed and grass issues. We stocked it with grass carp 2 per acre. 3 years later pond was immaculate and the grass neatly trimmed about 4' up the bank, Never understood that one until frog gigging one night and low and behold saw three of them huge grass carp mostly out of the water and grazing away. Told my dad and he said I needed to catch 2 or 3 and move them to another pond.
Took a while but I finally succeded and the first pond came back nicely, a few weeds in the shallow end some stuff on the very bottom. The pond we moved the three into also got cleaned up, a bit slower and never was devoid of vegetation. They say once these fish reach 3 feet their appetite decreases but I'm not sure. They are eating machines and when properly stocked I think very useful but overstocking/overselling leads to serious problems. My current pond is about an acre and I was told to put 2 in and see how it goes for a year. One died a couple months later, not sure why. But the following spring still had some weeds but not enough to worry about. The pond management guys I talked to said sounds good but in 5-6 years you need to add another one or 2.
Now you got me worried, but I guess if they start giving us problems I can shoot some with the bow.
I'm trying 1/2 a fish/acre in one of my lakes. Grass carp eat 2 1/2x their body weight per day. That's a lot of plants. Unfortunately our experience with grass carp is it's an all or none solution. But I think mostly we get impatient and don't give them a chance to get big and eat more. Everyone wants veg control in just a couple years. I'm trying the patient approach.
Have 2 in a 1 1/2 acre pond. Put them in after we cleaned out and made deeper. Have had no problem with weeds. 4 years old and about 3 ft long now.