“Table Rock is different from other lakes. “I have never seen a largemouth crash an adult bluegill or sunfish on a bed,” says Babler. ![]() Bill Babler, a fishing guide from Shell Knob, Mo., has spent years chucking bluegill baits in Missouri and Arkansas lakes. ![]() Once a bluegill reaches spawning size, it’s only a target for the largest bass in the lake. Lakes with changing levels and less vegetation have greater fluctuations in their sunfish populations, and often see a stronger mix of green sunfish or pumpkinseed. Impoundments that have substantial amounts of grass will usually have strong, stable bluegill populations. It takes a minimum of two full years of growth in the very best conditions in the Deep South, and up to four years in colder climates with limited growing seasons, to reach spawning size. Northern bluegill have a lot of work to do in the summer and early fall to get their growth rate moving before winter shuts down their metabolism, reducing the amount of food they eat. South of the Mason Dixon Line, most sunfish have the opportunity to spawn more than once and have a long feeding cycle that is interrupted only by cold water for just a few months. Depending on food, water quality and cover, it may take four-plus-years to produce a hand-size bluegill, depending heavily on where it lives. In most impoundments, that will be bluegill,” said Beard.Ī bluegill’s growth rate is slower than many think. Compared to other food sources, and depending on the watershed, largemouth can ingest up to 40 percent of their annual diet from sunfish. “They are both members of the sunfish family, and they make every effort to inhabit the same littoral and sublittoral dominion (see illustration below). “The relationship between bass and sunfish is inextricably linked together as predator and prey,” said Doug Beard, a USGA fisheries biologist in the Washington, D.C., area. ![]() Most of us have taken a child fishing for bluegill, ending with a largemouth crushing the little 3-inch sunfish and bending your kid’s Mickey Mouse rod to the verge of collapse. Whether it’s bluegill, green sunfish, rock bass or pumpkinseed, all of these fish play a critical role in the diet of most bass throughout the United States. There is a reason fish biologists use sunfish as the primary food source for bass when stocking a pond. How often are you throwing baits that imitate sunfish? On your next trip, as you peer into your bait box, ask yourself if you’re missing a key element that bass feed on. These “go-to baits” evoke strong memories of battles won and lost, but are selectively not remembered for the many hours of casting without a hit. We reach for baits that have rested in our tacklebox for years, like comfort food on a Sunday morning.
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