Stocking

Most of the calls I have received this week have been related to stocking.

I would like to stress that crawfish ponds are beneficial to themselves for each season because they regenerate each year and do not always require restocking. Consider restocking if a pond has been:

1. Idle for a period of time (a season or longer)

2. It is a new pond

3. extensive levee work.

Typically, it seems as though a common practice is to restock annually; however, this could actually cause more harm to the population than good. If a pond gets a high density population, the crawfish will be small and catch numbers will be problematic. When you drain the pond, you will see crawfish burrowing into the levees where they will wait for the next season. If nothing damages those burrows, such as levee work, the crawfish will come out and serve as next years harvestable population. Remember that the goal is to have a happy medium in size and density and to avoid overpopulating a pond.