Smallmouths in Eight-Acre Pond

[Bruce Litton]

All this time, I never knew of any small ponds with smallmouths, besides the golf course pond, growing up, with some tossed in, never to reproduce. But I caught a 13-incher, along with two largemouths of 2 1/2 pounds & another less than a pound, in a pond with some rocks, north of Rt. 80. I won't divulge the name, because I don't want to step on the toes of anyone who might treasure this place as his own. Don't know if I'll ever return. It's pretty far from home & I have other places to try.

[The Birdman]

yup the state stocked it. hopefully in about 5-7 years those fish get big.

[FASTEDDIE29]

Oh no, that's my secret Smallie honey hole, yes hole. That's basically what it is! Sounds like a fun day Bruce. Keep em comin!!!

[buzzbaiter]

Years ago the Pa Fish Commisssion stocked yearling smallmouth(3-4") into 5 different ponds(1-10 acres) that had beend drained, dams rebuilt and filled up again. None held smallmouth before yet they decided to give it a shot. They also stocked other species such as crappie, bass and perch. None of the ponds was able to support the smallmouth as they disappeared within a year. No reason other than maybe they got to warm or ph was an issue as many of the pocono lakes are slightly acidic.

They've also tried stocking thousands into the larger pocono lakes(100+ acres) with little to no success even though many have rocky or gravel botoms to some extent. Its just odd. It does seem that lakes with large streams feeding into them seem to hold more smallies such as Beltzville and Wallenpaupack.

[jimmythegreek]

the big necessity for smallies is the bait population. smallmouths rarely eat anything larger than your average shiner, their main food is baitfish like herring, and in bodies without a good population they rely on young of the year panfish and even bass. Take a look at Swartswood, the sheds, lake mohawk, etc and they are your average north jersey lake/reservoir w many having little to no waterflow in and out. SM act alot like hybrids do, roaming open water chasing bait out deep, while some stay shallow like LM bass do looking for juvenile panfish or any other food they can find. Even 5lb smallies have a small mouth that are actually slightly smaller than a hybrids mouth in equivelent fish size

[UglyStick]

Assuming we are all talking about the same place, John (Birdman) is correct, the state stocked smallies there. The first year they didn't seem to be successfully spawning so they added more. Now, I do see larger (1 - 2 lb fish) there and I did see spawning pairs on the beds this spring although time will tell if they were successful. Funny this came up, I was actually planning on heading over there tonight at dusk.