Barra in a private dam ?????

[Member]

G'day all

My old man has a spoon dam appox. 800 m2 surface area x 2.4 mtr deep. Located at Bungundarra, Just north of Yeppoon. Its quite a healthy looking dam with water lillies and it's chock a block full of pearch & sleepy cod. We are thinking of putting a few (10???)  barra fingerlings in just for a bit of fun for the kids.

This is by no means going to be an elaborate set up.

What do we need to know?

Would Barra be the go or maybe Togas would be better?

How many Fingerlings would you suggest as a start?

Will we need to feed them? I guess the barra will demolish all the other fish pretty quick.

Will we need to supply additional Oxygen?

Will they survive the cool Winters?

Any advice would be greatly appreciated. Thanks.

Cheers
Jono

[Member]

You can stock it with fingerlings, or you could catch some legal size fish and release them into it.  It is not illegal to relocate the fish into your dam, as long as you abide by the size limits and bag limits.  Small fingerlings may turn into a food source for the perch you have in there though.  You shouldn't need to provide anything extra as the dam seems capable of supporting the fish that are already there.

[Member]

jono
if you give me a call at the hatchery on 0418984652 or 49729548 i can help you answer your questions.  we have a heap of barra at the moment ready for your purposes.

cheers
kurt

[Member]

Kurt,
Growing fingerlings, growing dam levels, growing wet season activity- what do ya do with a pond full of activated fish?
Let em go and hope, or keep lettin' em grow in a pond? That'd be a tough decision wouldn't it?
I have been hearing a few smaller barra 'popping' in the weeds in the odd bits of good weather in Awoonga. This is a good sign. What size do you think the released fish in Awoonga (from March) might be now?
Johnny

[Member]

johnny
yeah this run of fingerlings at the moment for monduran, awoonga and lenthals are looking pretty good, but with the increasing water levels i suppose we will have to stock when we can as many of the western cq impoundments have 20 metres of water flowing over them they have hesitated to stock until march (best time of the year i reckon).  i am running at around 300% capacity as of tonight with another 200,000 70 mm fish to move into the hatchery in the next 48 hours.  the stocking will be a little tongue in cheek, but i will be pushing the 250,000 into awoonga in the next 2 weeks in similar locations.  i spent sometime out there a few weeks ago in kens bay and watched 2 x 45-48cm barra move past the boat.

 fingerlings are good as they are not as prone to migratory patterns as adult fish.  if you want to see their habits and see what i mean you should come out for a pond harvest and you will see their exact moments.  the number of fish that will exit the dam will depend on two aspects, 1. the amount of flow going over the dam wall (more water the more fish will go obviously, but it will require a heap for any ot move), 2. the timing, before the end of january there will be a couple move, but if it holds up until after jan 2011 it should reduce the urge for many.  still we need a heap more piss in that valley before she goes.  may be a good tipping comp when will awoonga go over???

the barra that we released in march are now 40 to 45cm and should be around the 60cm mark by the 12 month mark.  again, like awoonga fish you wont see them on the end of your line until 67-70cm.  get into this bay early morning and it sounds awesome, you obviously can tell the difference in the size of the boofs.

cheers
kurt