Here is a BG HBG issue I've been having. They don't like to bite on live worms, crickets, plastic lures, or even Stubby Steves. If I throw out some AquaMax they hit it pretty hard. I only feed once a day right now, and I don't overfeed IMO (maybe 1/2 a solo cup of feed at a time). I have tried really small hooks which I don't like because they can get them deep if I don't set the hook at the right time which when fishing with a 5 year old can be difficult.
Any suggestions? I hate to stop feeding because they are really growing well.
The only thing I have caught my HBG with are small white rooster-tails and a medium sized hook with a pinch off an old small purple plastic worm (a home-made stubby steve's). I have not tried anything else however. I have had better luck with the small spinners. My HBG are about a 1/4 pound, still pretty small.
I feel left out when mid-westerners talk about their fish still feeding, mine stopped noticeably feeding a week or so ago and they actually slowed down long before that. My water temps are 55 top to bottom, but no top water takers, just FHM's. Hmmmm?
One of the original fish from when we bought the place
The fish the young man is holding looks like a hybrid cross between a BG and RES.
Try 1/64 oz jig hooks. I find pan fish are lots less likely to swallow them as opposed to regular fish hooks. I also like the way they present the bait better. Tip them with Gulp Alive brand artificial chartreuse waxies or a quarter to half inch long piece of the Gulp Alive worms. If the bite is really tough go to thin slivers of cut bait on the jig hook.
That is what I have good luck with in cold water.
The fish the young man is holding looks like a hybrid cross between a BG and RES.
Try 1/64 oz jig hooks. I find pan fish are lots less likely to swallow them as opposed to regular fish hooks. I also like the way they present the bait better. Tip them with Gulp Alive brand artificial chartreuse waxies or a quarter to half inch long piece of the Gulp Alive worms. If the bite is really tough go to thin slivers of cut bait on the jig hook.
That is what I have good luck with in cold water.
John, do you find that the cold water bite is best when visibility is pretty clear, and worst in muddy water?
And don't forget the Gulp waxies in white. I use two of them on my jig. This time a year I will use a 1/32 oz jig head because of the lower water temps move the fish a little deeper and deeper is where my larger cnbg hang out. Unless the feeder is going off
When my water is off color like kinda of muddy, I will use pink or bubblegum colored baits if I am fishing around six foot deep or less and black when fishing deeper.
Noel, I think I've been trying to figure out why fish won't bite for most of my life.
The fish the young man is holding looks like a hybrid cross between a BG and RES.
Try 1/64 oz jig hooks. I find pan fish are lots less likely to swallow them as opposed to regular fish hooks. I also like the way they present the bait better. Tip them with Gulp Alive brand artificial chartreuse waxies or a quarter to half inch long piece of the Gulp Alive worms. If the bite is really tough go to thin slivers of cut bait on the jig hook.
That is what I have good luck with in cold water.
John, do you find that the cold water bite is best when visibility is pretty clear, and worst in muddy water?
I can not say for sure but I do know if I get rain that causes turbidity both the feeding and the bite can be off a day or two. I do not know if that is because of the water clarity or barometric pressure or some other weather feature or what. But I do notice a tougher bite in those conditions. Then is when I sometimes go to a thin sliver of cut bait or a shiner. I suspect live worms or other live bait would also work but it has been a couple years since I used live worms. Since John F introduced me to the Gulp Waxies I find using the artificial Gulp baits stay on the hook so much better than live bait so I use it most of the time. I can often catch 8 or 10 fish before having to re-bait. With live worms it seems like it was almost every cast if I did not catch a fish a small BG would suck or eat the worm off the hook.
Another Gulp product I have found that works well when the bite is tougher is the small 1" Gulp Minnow. They do not stay on the hook as well as the Waxies (so are not as convenient and more expensive to use), maybe only twice as good as live bait, but I find fish will bite them when they sometimes will not bite my other offerings. The Gulp Maggots I also use but they only last about half as long on the hook as the Waxies so the Waxies are my preferred bait. I will use a single one most of the time but sometimes two.
It is important to point out that I have only been fishing very much for about four years. So I am by no means an expert at angling. This is just the way I have been pretty successful most of the time catching BG in my pond. I fish nowhere other than my ponds so results elsewhere may vary.
Edit: here is a picture posted in another thread of a SMB caught on a jig head tipped with a Gulp chartreuse Waxie.
small SMB caught on Gulp Waxie I think that is a 1/64 oz jig or maybe even lighter. If the bite is tough I do not use a swivel. I just happen to have one on that day as I was using other lures at times.
The last pic does look like a BG X RES.
HBG should be aggressive and easy to catch (subject to temps) while other crosses are not a easily catchability.
Anyone have thoughts on the catchability of BG X GSF vs other lepomis crosses ?
My experience is that BG X RES are a bit larger but they are not as catchable as HBG (BG X GSF). Still a good catchable fish but not as aggressive as HBG.
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Some info from a prior post.
North American Journal of Fisheries Managemen6t: 156-167, 1986
¸ Copyright by the American Fisheries Society1 986
Evaluation of Male Bluegill X Female Green Sunfish Hybrids for
Stocking Mississippi Farm Ponds
MARTIN W. BRUNSON and H. RANDALL ROBINETTE
The use of hybrid sunfishes in ponds has been
suggested as an attractive alternative to the more
traditional stocking policies involving the bluegill
(Lepomism acrochirus) or redears unfish( Lepomis
microlophus), or both, in combination with the
largemouth bass (Micropterus salmoides) (Lewis
and Heidinger 1978a).
Ellison and Heidinger
(1978) surveyed 30 privately owned hybrid
sunfish ponds in southern Illinois and determined
that the presence of largemouth bass and supplemental
feeding were the two most important variables
related to growth of hybrids.
Growth of redear
sunfish x green sunfish and bluegill x green
sunfish (BG x GS) hybrids exceeded the average
growth for bluegill in Illinois (Lopinot 1972). The
BG x GS hybrids reached an acceptable catch size
in a shorter time than channel catfish (Ictalurus
punctatus), and they were easier to catch where
both were stocked for recreational fishing.
Several hybrid combinations have been recognized
as having potential in pond management
(Lewis and Heidinger 1978b), but the BG x GS
hybrid appears to have the most attractive combination
of desirable attributes. Like other hybrids,
the BG x GS hybrid exhibits rapid growth
(Childers 1967; Ellison and Heidinger 1978) and
probable hybrid vigor (Brunson and Robinette
1985), produces mostly males (Childers and Bennett
1961; Laarman 1973; Brunson 1983), and is
highly vulnerable to capture by hook and line
(Henderson and Whiteside 1976; Crandall and
Durocher 1980; Brunson 1983). Only the BG x
GS hybrid, however, is well suited to artificial
feeding (Lewis and Heidinger 1978a) and frequents
shallow water areas, where it may be more
accessible to the pond angler than some other hybrids.
The BG x GS hybrid is probably the most
common commercially produced hybrid sunfish
in the southeastern United States.
From an angler's viewpoint, increased growth is
highly desirable.H owever, perhapsm ore important
to the angler is the presumed high catchability of
hybrid sunfish. This vulnerability to hook-andline
capture has been alluded to by many authors
but relatively few experimental data exist to substantiate
such statements. Childers (1967) cited
one instance where a population of more than
10,000 BG x GS hybrids was decimated by anglers
during the first week of fishing. Childers and
Bennett (1967) reported hook-and-line yields in a
0.4-hectare pond stocked with redear x green sunfish
hybrids and largemouth bass that surpassed
those of comparably fished bluegill ponds. They
concluded that hybrids were more aggressive, less
wary, and less able to learn how to avoid being
caught than their parent species. Henderson and
Whiteside (1976) confirmed the vulnerability of
hybrids to angling, and Ellison and Heidinger
(1978) reported that hybrid sunfish were much
easier to catch than channel catfish when both were
stocked for recreational fishing. They also confirmed
the aggressivenesos f hybrid sunfisha s reported
by swimmers who were nipped by these
fish. Crandall and Durocher (1980) reported that
catchability of the BG x GS hybrid was significantly
higher than that ofbluegill x redear sunfish
or green x redear sunfish hybrids.
Other than theses tudies,t he literature on hybrid
sunfishes is the result of laboratory or controlled,
short-term pond studies with relatively narrow objectives.
The total catch of
146 hybrids during the 2-h period was 21% of the
population.
These high catch rates,
especially at Britt Pond, once again confirm the
aggressivenessa nd vulnerability of the BG x GS
hybrid, and point to the importance of strict control
of harvest in hybrid ponds. Especially significant
is the effect that poachers can have on a
hybrid population.
Though hybrid sunfish are not a panacea
for all farm pond management problems, they can
be used under certain conditions to produce desirable
populations of rapidly growing fish. With
a rapid growth rate, low population fecundity, and
high catchability, these fish can be used to create
high quality bream fishing when properly managed
Wow! 21% in two hours.
I know when I first started fishing my main pond and discovered there were a few hybrids mixed in with my initial stocking (IIRC about 30 were caught) it was not long before I "fished them out". It soon got to where I no longer caught any more. (I transferred all I caught to my old pond).
About the time I "got rid of them", I decided I really did like the HBG as I kept catching them and they were growing great in my old pond.
Since then I have introduced thousands of home grown hybrids (both HBG and RESxGSF hybrids as well as a rare BGxRES) in my main pond and catch and fillet many annually. The hybrids come primarily from my sediment and forage ponds where they seem to be produced naturally in significant numbers.
I really like the hybrids. But then I'm a mutt kind of a guy.
My sense of GSF and hybrids of them is that they are not as efficient at foraging zooplankton (which even harvest size BG are). They prefer the larger kinds of forage like FHM, YOY fry, Gambusia, crayfish, larger aquatic insects, etc. If these are plentiful, they will grow much better. I can see where they would need feed more so than BG which can feed at lower trophic levels than GSF and their hybrids.
One thing I notice about BG is that they will approach a fly, inspect it, at which point they will either suck it in or move on. A green sunfish or hybrid just attacks them. They can also be caught repeatedly.
That would seem to make sense that the GSF have a large mouth and the BG have small mouth for a reason. Interesting information about BG being more adapted at harvesting zooplankton.
The GSF and their hybrids are definitely fish food pellet chow hounds. If I fish after feeding and catch one they are almost always stuffed to the gills, so to speak. They get more than their fair share of the pellets.
