boat and seine up the fry. It would be very hard 

 to collect such small fish — 1/2 to % inch long- 

 after tliey scatter to look for food, and many of 

 them would be eaten by larger bass. Many of our 

 bass are planted as 1-inch fingerlings, so we usually 

 stock holding ponds with 40.000 to 60,000 fry to 

 the acre, and distribute the young fish about 2 

 weeks later. If we are to plant larger bass, we 

 put smaller numbers of fry into rearing ponds 

 like this one, for a longer time. 



What happens- to the parent bass? When they 

 are through spawning and the fry have been re- 

 moved, the spawning pond is drained and the brood 

 bass are moved to winter quarters — a heavily ferti- 

 lized pond containing bluegills and other small 

 fish that spawn in great numbers and provide the 

 bass with food for the winter. 



If you think of tlie last time you went bass fish- 

 ing, you'll probably recall that the water also 

 had a good number of smaller fish like bluegills 

 or some other kind of sunfish. A water that makes 

 for sood bass fishing is one in which the food chain 

 is working smoothly. The predators (bass) are 

 living on the prey species (bluegills, for instance). 

 The prey species have many more young than the 

 bass. They spawn and grow so rapidly on plants 

 and insect life that many escape the hungry bass 

 to become adult fish and produce more young. The 

 bass in turn keep the prey s]iecies from becoming 



so nimierous that they eat all the plant and insect 

 life. 



To get the ideal balance of all the foods that 

 make for good fishing, we generally stock a fer- 

 tilized pond with 100 largemouth black bass and 

 1,000 bluegills to the acre. If a pond is not fer- 

 tilized, we usually cut those numbers in half. You 

 can help to keep your favorite pond productive by 

 fishing the bluegills or other panfish as well as 

 the bass, and by removing undesirable fish like 

 carp. 



Don't dabble your fingers in this pond of chan- 

 nel catfish. They are young, but their fins have 

 sharp spines. Instead of waiting to see these 

 catfish fed their ration of ground fresh meat, let's 

 visit the pond where the eggs for these fish were 

 taken. 



These pens of wood and mesh wire are about 

 6 feet wide, stretch about 12 feet from the pond 

 bank, and extend about 1 foot above the water sur- 

 face. They are set about 1 foot into the pond 

 bottom so the catfish can't dig out. Catfish seem 

 to like to nest in caves or under ledges, so at the 

 beginning of the spawning season each pen has 

 a 10-gallon can or jar set into the pond bank, 1 or 

 2 feet below the water surface, with the open 

 end away from the bank. 



For each pen we select a ripe pair, with a male 

 larger than the female because he will protect the 



CATFISH REARING PONDS. THE MAN AT THE RIGHT HAS A NESTING JAR. 



