Those are some awsome fish ya got there!!! Not only is the gill a monster but that perch is a beast as well!!! Congrats on the great work you all have done!!
Thank you. It's a lot more work than many realize.
To produce trophy size panfish the idea is to reproduce the bluegills and yellow perch in another pond and to only plant male bluegill and female yellow perch in this pond and feed them well on artificial feed. One of a couple ways to produce trophy size bluegill and yellow perch. The other way is to feed an artificial diet along with a large population of small largemouth bass to keep their numbers down.
Unfortunately I had some female bluegill escape the cage they were held in due to some ice thawing and pushing up against the cage which tipped part of it under water. I also dropped a male perch in the pond accidentally when sexing my YOY perch. Now I have unwanted reproduction and it's just a matter of time before I have too many smaller fish and less than optimum growth rates. Since I don't have largemouth in the pond it's difficult to control the numbers, and smallmouth by themselves aren't good at controlling bluegills. I no longer raise largemouths for several reasons but one is they push the other species away from the pellets.
This fall I will be draining the pond for the third time and temporarily moving the fish to two smaller ponds until it's rotenoned or limed, it's filled back up, and it's safe to move the fish back in. This time there will be no cages for fish to get loose. Maybe I'll get it right the third time!
