Diy Stocking One Pond To Another / Barbless Hook

[livemusic]

I have a friend who owns several ponds, including one new one that intrigues me because it was dug to make way for a highway and it's 25' deep in places, which is deep around here. He has put some bluegill and crappie in there from ones he caught in his other ponds. I want to help him do the same for bass; he will let me fish his ponds. Anyone have any tips on this? What about making a live well, anyone done that? If I make one, it has to be small because I would be fishing out of a pond jumper (similar to Pelican Bass Raider). I wonder if I could do well putting them in a ice chest and just stick a bubbler aerator in there. This boat is 22" wide at bass where my feet are, I could probably find a smaller ice chest to fit and get a few bass at a time. Then, I'd have to take them in my truck about a mile away to the new pond. Any tips on keeping bass alive for this?

 

Another thing I thought I'd try is, we like to fish a fluke there and I was thinking of crimping down the barb on the hook to minimize potential damage to the bass. Yesterday, in one of his ponds, the bass were swallowing the fluke like crazy and we ended up keeping five bass to eat, letting the others go. Had a good afternoon, caught about 30 total. But there were a couple of those five that even though the hook went down into the good, hooking inside the stomach, I don't know how but I somehow got the hook out. I wonder if a bass could survive that. We didn't chance it, we harvested those. Anyway, it would be less damage if there is no barb. Just crimp the barb down with pliers until I can find some barbless hooks?

 

Sidenote... anyone who has fished a barbless hook, do you lose a lot of fish, just curious? I mean, they shake it off and get away and you never boat them.

[C0lt]

depending on how far the ponds are from each other, I think your best bet would be to leave the boat at home, and do some shore fishing. If the ponds are less than 100 yards or so apart you could just hook up on the bank and walk them over to the next pond, each fish individually. However if the ponds aren't close together you need to make yourself a live well. 

[livemusic]

depending on how far the ponds are from each other, I think your best bet would be to leave the boat at home, and do some shore fishing. If the ponds are less than 100 yards or so apart you could just hook up on the bank and walk them over to the next pond, each fish individually. However if the ponds aren't close together you need to make yourself a live well. 

 

As I said in the post, it's a mile away.

[MIbassyaker]

I crimp the barb down on all my single hooks now, and even trebles on some lures. At first I just did it occasionally when I had a difficult unhooking, and was momentarily too lazy to switch hooks, thinking "oh well, I'll just make sure the line is tight so the next fish doesn't throw the hook." 

 

What I discovered was (1) my hooksets got more reliable now that I didn't have to make the barb penetrate the fish, (2) unhooking went a LOT faster letting me get fish -- and my line -- back in the water quickly, and (3) I actually didn't notice an increase in fish throwing the hook at all.  It's possible I lose a few more due to the lack of a barb, but I probably make that number up, and then some, by having more hookups that penetrate all the way to the bend, and don't tear large holes in the fish's mouth. People forget, the barbs on hooks were originally there to hold live bait, not to hold the fish.

[nosdog2]

Does your state DNR offer any stocking programs?    Some are free depending on the size of the pond. 

[Crestliner2008]

Bass are a pretty hardy species. Given a large enough cooler with some ice and reasonable aerator device, you can probably move them with no difficulty - BUT, you'd do the bass a great favor by only moving one (or two at most) at a time and moving them very soon after catching them. I know it's a pain to do that, but it's the results that you are after, not the convenience of your time.

 

As far as barbless goes, I've been using barbless hooks for a decade now. That includes treble hooks as well as singles. I even close down the barb on my circle hooks. I do loose a fish from time to time (rarely), but so what? Do you "have to" land everything you catch? I know I don't. And I do catch the majority of fish that hit.

 

The only hooks I leave the barbs on are my drop shot hooks. I found that going barbless in that case has a tendency to loose far too many smallmouth on the first jump. Probably due to the weight being below the hook and giving the fish a leverage advantage when breaking the surface.

 

I also never fish any crankbait with more than two trebles. I always remove the center treble on all my minnow type baits and jerkbaits. Have lost very few doing this and it does reduce eye injuries. And again, all my treble barbs are crushed down.

[livemusic]

Hmmm... do you think that adding some ice to the water will help keep them alive? Didn't think of that. But I have thought that if we do this, we should do it before the hot summer.

 

I wish we could have done it pre-spawn. I wonder how late small bass will spawn. I had a friend say one time that he found eggs in small bass much later than you would think... I think he said on into the summer.

[C0lt]

As I said in the post, it's a mile away.

my mistake, must have went right over it. 

[WPCfishing]

Get a 12vt aquarium aerator for the cooler. 

[Ski213]

We did this for a pond once. As has been said prior we used a cooler and an aerator. Spliced a cigarette lighter plug thing into the aerator. Put the cooler in the back of the truck and ran the wire through the window. It worked pretty well. We didn't lose any. I think the key was minimal time out of the water.

There's a science to stocking. Fish and wildlife will generally help you out with that for a pretty minimal fee. That being said we winged it and got some fish going. Kind of rewarding to take a new pond that's barren and get some catchable fish in it.