I added 100 F1 Tiger Bass fingerlings to my new pond around the second week of this past June. At the time of stocking they were about 1.5", about the size of a large minnow. They are now in the 4" range and about as big around as a cigar. My pond has been fertilized twice thus far this season and has minnows for forage and my bream have spawned out twice. Is this growth rate for the F1's about right? Does anyone have any information about how the growth rates for Tigers such as 4 mos., 6 mos., 1 year, etc.? Thanks in advance for any information.

I don't believe F1 LMB growth rate would be significantly different than that of Northern or Florida LMB. The difference will be maximum size potential determined by average life span. Assuming the right sizes of forage are available to a LMB throughout the life of the fish, it has the potential for maximum growth limited by lifespan. I'm sure genetics play a role in growth rate, but there is no specific "growth-rate" for any fish....all depends on forage, stocking rate (population size), and environmental conditions.

RLewis :

Overton is correct to my knowledge . No [little] difference for sure during first year . Your growth rate is on tract as described. The factors listed by Overton are the important ones. All the studies on year one LMB fry/yoy that I have seen show no difference in early life between Fla. Nort. or F1. only minor ones going both ways. ewest

Just for my own future knowledge, is there any reason you didn't select 100 gorilla bass instead?

BD :

See the following posts.

http://www.pondboss.com/ubb/ultimatebb.php?ubb=get_topic;f=5;t=000093

http://www.pondboss.com/ubb/ultimatebb.php?ubb=get_topic;f=5;t=000086

I think what RLewis wanted was F1 not northerns.
ewest

And I took a different view from this article. I really hate it when people confuse something, and then everything gets ALL mixed up. I read this article as the gorilla is the best of the subspecies:
http://www.strikeking.com/journal/journal022-1.shtml

Some quotes:

"The Gorilla Bass is what we call an F1 hybrid. This term is used for what occurs when you take two different subspecies and breed them. When we breed the really-aggressive northern bass with a pure Florida-strain bass that have been selectively bred, (the Tiger Bass) we get the Gorilla Bass, which has the Florida strain's genetics, which enables them to grow to very large sizes at a rapid rate and have the aggressiveness of the northern bass.

The resulting F1 fish the Gorilla Bass -- is extremely aggressive and extremely fast-growing. So, when Gorilla Bass reach 3 to 5 years old, they weigh anywhere from 6- to 10-pounds each. They'll continue to exhibit that aggressive feeding behavior, and anglers can catch them on artificial lures. "

This tells me the tiger is North and pure Florida (selective/ed ones) mixed = tiger, then tiger becomes gorilla????

I am lost somewhere, but how I took the article I would think you would want the gorilla, esp. from the last paragraph. quoted. I see it as tigers would not handle the warm to well since they are part northerns, but I probably just confused from this article.
So in plain english what makes a tiger and what makes a gorilla?

BD :

I think that your reference is the article that was in error that Greg and CB1 were talking about in the 2 posts I referenced. See below site by the the person quoted in error in the strike king article.

http://www.americansportfish.com/index.php?request=sportfish

You will notice they do not talk about gorilla bass at all but only tiger bass. My understanding is tiger bass are the first generation cross between a florida female and a northern male both specially selected for their size and aggressiveness. The only reference to gorilla bass I have seen is that it is a specially selected aggerssive northern bass . Your right that the confusion is frustrating. ewest

Well to re-hash this, there is also all these pages that mention this 'gorilla' bass, which only made it worse for me.
http://www.strikeking.com/journal/journal022-2.shtml

http://www.strikeking.com/journal/journal022-3.shtml

http://www.strikeking.com/journal/journal022-4.shtml

http://www.strikeking.com/journal/journal022-5.shtml

Each link was "gorilla" this, "gorilla" that. So there is no gorilla bass then, correct?

and to confuse even more Todd on his site calls them tigre and not tiger.

Hey, BD those tigre bass of Todd's are in my experimental pond...they may not be able to spell, but they can sure hunt their food.

BD :

My understanding is that when Strike King's reporter did the interview with Barry Smith the reporter got the names backwards in his notes. I think there is a gorilla bass -- it is a northern str. bass that has been selectively breed for aggressiveness. While the tiger bass is an F1 cross between a gorilla bass and a selected Fla bass. for size and aggression. If you read the SK articles and reverse the names I think it will be right. ewest

American Sportfish has copyright on that term..."Tiger Bass," so we use Tigre Bass. We have pure strain florida bass, tested at TAMU, spawned with domesticated strain of aggressive northern bass. American sportfish claims to have selected their own northern bass, but they buy them in Arkansas then resell them after spawning season as Gorilla bass. Just a marketing ploy on their part, but it has worked for them. The truth comes out.

I appreciate the information guys. The reason I was asking was when I received my fingerlings that were about 2" long the hatchery owner had a tank of larger F1's (6-8")he was about to deliver to another customer and he told me if I pellet feed and fertilize correctly my bass would be that big in about 90 days.

1.5"-4" in 3 months? Kewl. That's all of second year's growth up here.

Here its something like:
Year 0= 1.5"
Year 1= 4.4"
Year 2= 8.3"
Year 3= 11.4"
Year 4= 14.0"

I figure they'll get 10"-14" next year for you if food is good. But then again its only august and thats a vague guess. You probably still have a few more months. So long as food supply is good you should be fine and do better than that. A vet/pro could tell you more about feeding them but once you start, which is hard enough to do, you can't stop feeding them without problems.

RLewis,
I added my F1's in June '04. They were about 2" at that time. They grew very quickly and averaged 10-12" by spawning time this year (March to April). The YOY bass are now around 4" to 6" and the originals are 14"+.

Sarc

I stocked newly constructed 17 acre lake in mississippi with the f1 tiger bass June 2004. This past weekend I caught 17 fish 3 of which were 3.5lbs-4.0lbs (around 16" long) the other fish were all about 8" long. I thought this was some incredible growth for only 22 months of growing. The fish were very agressive even the small ones.

Coach :

Welcome to the PB forum. Good to have another Magnolia State'r on board. There are a few of us here. That would indeed be very good growth . Where did you get your tiger bass ? I am running an experiment on some now that were stocked at 8in. last fall. Any chance someone put a few larger ones in while you weren't watching. Is your forage base BG and RES and are you feeding them ?