Looking good! We got a little rain last week and our plots are in about the same shape as yours. Green but short. I'm already thinking about summer plots as well!!
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Originally posted by bgleaton View PostHere's some interesting information for our total feed amounts for this past year and some historical feed numbers from other years to compare.- 2023 Protein Feed - 30,135lbs (2022 & 2021 - we fed around 37,000lbs)
- 2023 Cottonseed - 6,430lbs (2022 & 2021 - we fed around 8,000lbs and 4,500lbs respectively)
- 2023 Corn - 9,500lbs (2022 & 2021 - we fed around 9,000 & 6,300lbs respectively)
For rainfall, we ended up getting around 22.5in for the year, which is right around average. 46% of this rainfall actually occurred between September through December, which is not normal for us. This particular time frame normally equates to around 30% of the annual rainfall. We are hoping the wetter fall/winter will help our deer herd into the next antler growing season.
Have a great day!
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BASS POND UPDATE:
As you can see from the pictures above, we have a lot of aquatic vegetation along with filamentous algae. My first question, is how do we prevent the algae to make it more fishable? I purchased a pond rake to clear some spots for the kids to fish but I’m sure that will be labor intensive. I’ve read about fertilizer treatments to keep the water less clear but also that it has to constantly be tested and reapplied throughout the year. The two other things I’ve read is that tilapia can help with eating algae and then possibly using some grass carp, which I know we would need permits. Does anyone know where I can get tilapia within 2-hours of Brady, TX? I’m heading out there on Thursday to add another 250 bluegills and 15lbs of shiners to the pond. I’m hopeful that we will be removing 10-15 bass from the pond that are under the acceptable weight index. We also just purchased a 2pk of the Pond King Honey Hole to put in our deeper waters (12-16ft deep) and will be dropping some other structures in the other deeper areas as well (8-12ft). I noticed that a lot of the mossback habitat we installed are in the 3-7ft areas and it appears that the pond weeds are growing all through them. Does anyone know if we need to put these deeper where vegetation isn’t growing? Just wanted to make sure we were setting these in the right spots. I would really appreciate if anyone has any feedback on these topics as we are trying our best to grow some big bass. Thanks!
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Originally posted by JeffJ View PostThe carp process is easy. We got half what they recommended and they did the job. They will live forever, are impossible to catch and will cruise the surface which is cool.
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Have a friend who put some carp in his 5acre tank over 15yrs ago; there still isn’t a single piece of grass or weed growing in that lake and we still see the carp ‘finning’ (they haven’t died off yet). No way I’d ever put carp in. Good luck in whatever you decide on; if carp, definitely go with less than the recommended amount like Jeff mentioned.
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Originally posted by Patton View PostHave a friend who put some carp in his 5acre tank over 15yrs ago; there still isn’t a single piece of grass or weed growing in that lake and we still see the carp ‘finning’ (they haven’t died off yet). No way I’d ever put carp in. Good luck in whatever you decide on; if carp, definitely go with less than the recommended amount like Jeff mentioned.
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Our family friends had a place between Junction and Sonora with a couple ponds on it. They put 5 carp in one of them for the same exact reasons. The ponds were loaded with bass but became unfishable due to the vegetation. The 5 carp worked well for that purpose and they probably could have put a few more in there without issue. Just like Jeff said, you'd see those big suckers cruising the top all the time, sometimes they chased lures/flies, but they were hard to hook up to .
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We ended up spraying around the shoreline with copper sulfate. After two days, the pond looked a lot better and became fishable. We are looking into purchasing a solar aerator to help prevent the filamentous algae instead of adding carp. Does anyone have any experience with these solar aerators?
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My family and I went out to the ranch for the last part of Spring Break this past week and were able to get a handful of things done out there. We worked on the big pond a lot so the kids could fish and added more forage fish for the bass. We ended up spraying the algae with copper sulfate and then used a big rake cutter to clear out some spots for the kids to fish. I was very impressed with how quickly the copper sulfate worked but I read that you have to be careful on how much you kill at a time because it can cause an oxygen issue in your pond. We were able to drop two of the Honey Hole structures in some areas that are 10+ft deep and also dropped 2 cedar brush piles in 9ft of water. The bass are looking good, just need to keep removing the small ones as much as possible and keep the water in good condition. We are going to try to get someone out there soon to help fix a small leak in the backside of our pond and do a fish survey to determine what we have and see if they have any recommendations on growing big bass. One thing I have noticed is that we have a lot of bluegill but when our fish feeder shoots out the feed we never see the fish boiling on the surface. I'm hoping that the fish will start eating the Purina Aqua Max because that stuff is crazy expensive!
The food plots look amazing with all of the rainfall we have gotten after January 1st - 4.35in for the year. This is the best our food plots have looked in years. In fact, our deer aren't even touching the protein feeders or cottonseed feeders right now just because of how green it is out there. The wheat, oats, chicory, and silver river clover are all doing good in all three plots. I'm sure that will change quickly but it's nice to see that the land is providing so much food for the deer herd.
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Awesome update. Our deer aren't touching protein right now either with the health of our winter plots. I actually turned 2 of our timed feeders off and turned the 3rd one back to 2 seconds a day. Hopefully the plots will last another month and then we can get some spring/summer plots in the ground to carry them through.
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