Who likes lily pads?

[moguy1973]

I do! I do!

My wife's older sister and brother-in-law just moved to Columbia and bought a house with this sweet looking 4 acre pond in the back yard.  Shore access is limited to dragging frogs and toads across the tops of the pads except on the dam, but the bass seem to like to crash through the pads to get them.  With just a couple days of fishing it looks like to be full of 12-14" healthy bass, with a few 2lbers that I caught off the dam, and the previous owners says there's a good supply of crappie and green sunnies in it too.  Should be fun to fish in the summer time.

 

[fishinwrench]

Small patches of pads, I like. 

Acres upon acres of them?   Ugh! 😳

[moguy1973]

25 minutes ago, fishinwrench said:

Small patches of pads, I like. 

Acres upon acres of them?   Ugh! 😳

They are going to cut some of them back next year once they see how many die off this winter.

[fishinwrench]

42 minutes ago, moguy1973 said:

They are going to cut some of them back next year once they see how many die off this winter.

I'd say about the same amount that died off last winter....as in None.

Haul in a bunch of grapefruit to basketball sized rock !

[dan hufferd]

I bet one of those weedless mice would be fun ! 

[Quillback]

When I lived and fished in Massachusetts, many of the ponds looked just like that picture, just full of pads.  Used to drag the Ol' Johnson Silver Spoon with a white Uncle Josh trailer across the pads, when I hit and edge or a hole in the pads, I'd let I drop and flutter down.  Never was a numbers game, but used to get some nice fish doing that.  

[fishinwrench]

A lot of casting practice for a few bites.

[moguy1973]

4 hours ago, fishinwrench said:

A lot of casting practice for a few bites.

Must be quite a few hungry fish in this pond.  I was getting bites about every 3 casts on Sunday when it was overcast throwing a horny toad across the pads.  Most missed but I probably hooked up with 10-12 or so in a couple hours.

[MOsmallies]

15 hours ago, moguy1973 said:

looks like to be full of 12-14" healthy bass, with a few 2lbers that I caught off the dam, and the previous owners says there's a good supply of crappie and green sunnies in it too.  Should be fun to fish in the summer time.

Do some selective harvest with those 12" bass and crappie

[MrGiggles]

57 minutes ago, MOsmallies said:

Do some selective harvest with those 12" bass and crappie

That is the best thing you can do, a lot of people worry about overfishing a pond, when usually the opposite is true. Keep pressure on the crappie and bass especially, or you'll have a pond full of 12" skinny bass and tiny crappie. Those 12" bass are good eating.

Stocking some forage is not a bad idea either.

Grass carp will help keep the vegetation down. Some is good, but it can really take over a small pond, to the point that you can hardly fish it.