Pond Boss Forums GENERAL QUESTIONS Pond Boss 2 Former World Record BG caught at same place

Just came across this old read on 2 former WORLD RECORD BG caught in Alabama and thought I would bring it here. To give credit from where I got this the Article came from a Old Game and Fish Magazine. Which I found a link to the entire article and linked at the Bottom.

When T.S. Hudson went bream fishing on April 9, 1950 — Easter Sunday — he probably knew that his destination had produced the world-record bluegill back in May 1947. Coke McKenzie had caught that 4-pound, 10-ounce bream from Ketona Lake. That flooded limestone quarry is two miles north of the Birmingham International Airport, next to State Route 79. (Actually two Ketona Lakes occupy the site; the record fish came from the small 18-plus-acre pit.)
Regardless of what he actually did know, on that April day more than a half-century ago Hudson landed a bluegill that weighed 4 pounds, 12 ounces, was 15 inches long, and had a girth of 18 1/4 inches.
Since the quarry’s water was crystal-clear, Hudson and McKenzie had to hide from the watchful bream by moving away from the vertical bank. For the same reason, both anglers used light line and long cane poles to dangle their earthworms in the water.
Biologists, eager to learn the quarry’s secrets, sampled its bream and found no genetic reason for the massive fish. They did, however, find an environment suitable for producing big bream. There was nothing magical: The habitat had just the right combination of minerals, population control and fishing pressure.
According to biologists, the presence of limestone promotes high growth rates and higher productivity, because it enhances nutrients. Of course, uncontrolled reproduction would quickly lead to overcrowding and, consequently, small fish. But Ketona’s bream numbers failed to grow for two reasons: the unnatural shape of its shoreline, resulting in limited spawning habitat, and abundant bream-devouring bass.
Bream not eaten had an opportunity to grow beyond the diameter of a frying pan, provided they didn’t inhale a worm or grasshopper hiding a barbed hook. Lack of fishing pressure could have been a reason for bream reaching old age, but that seems unlikely in Birmingham at that period of time. Rather, most anglers may not have learned how to fish in the gin-clear water.
The Ketona Lakes seem unchanged since the midpoint of the last century, but that’s difficult to determine, as a corporation now owns the property, and it’s not open for fishing. You can, however, view the old quarry by searching Google maps on the Internet and entering the words “Ketona Lakes.”


http://www.gameandfishmag.com/2010/09/28/fishing_crappies-panfish-fishing_al_0508_02/

flooded limestone quarry -- a big hint there.

"According to biologists, the presence of limestone promotes high growth rates and higher productivity, because it enhances nutrients."
Check out the Fla phosphate pit lakes which have both fertilizer and limestone in one location.



"Of course, uncontrolled reproduction would quickly lead to overcrowding and, consequently, small fish. But Ketona’s bream numbers failed to grow for two reasons: the unnatural shape of its shoreline, resulting in limited spawning habitat, and abundant bream-devouring bass." Did I hear management of populations to reach goals.



From -- http://forums.pondboss.com/ubbthreads.php?ubb=showflat&Number=366583#Post366583

In-Fisherman

"Pits created by mining operations often fill with rainwater, springwater or groundwater from the water table. Where water chemistry is suitable, bass and many other species thrive. Pits are typically deep and clear, with manmade structure such as shelves, roadbeds, mine shafts, and spoil piles.

Biomass is usually low due to infertile conditions, but trophy fish are possible. Some Florida phosphate pits are fertile and produce extraordinary bass fishing where the harvest is controlled. And the world-record 4-pound, 2-ounce bluegill was caught in Ketona Lake, a flooded limestone mine in Alabama."

The Fla lakes waters flow through natural limestone formations into the old phosphate pits so the two in common happens.

In much of the south the limiting factor in water fertility is acidity ( the lack of limestone). Once lime is added nothing else is required. Some locations require P but others do not. That is why it is necessary to know your watershed/water and not just blindly add fertilizer.

Here is another report on Ketona:

"Biologists, eager to learn the quarry’s secrets, sampled its bream and found no genetic reason for the massive fish. They did, however, find an environment suitable for producing big bream. There was nothing magical: The habitat had just the right combination of minerals, population control and fishing pressure.



According to biologists, the presence of limestone promotes high growth rates and higher productivity, because it enhances nutrients."


The point is all pits , like all ponds are different. Those that are old hard mineral pits (rock ,aggregate , granite etc) are usually infertile. As noted by IN-Fisherman.That was the point Dave and I were making.

I'm curious about this part:

"Biologists, eager to learn the quarry’s secrets, sampled its bream and found no genetic reason for the massive fish. They did, however, find an environment suitable for producing big bream. There was nothing magical: The habitat had just the right combination of minerals, population control and fishing pressure.

No genetic reason? Surely if it were just a matter of water quality, population control, and limited fishing pressure, we would be seeing 4 pound bluegills turning up more frequently?

What were the standards applied, in regards to genetic research on bluegills in 1950?

Fast forward to today....given what we know now, should we at least be open to the possibility of those Ketona bluegills having had a predisposition toward enhanced growth?

For the curious:

Mount showing T.S. Hudson's world record, courtesy of his son, Scott:

http://bigbluegill.com/photo/ts-hudson-bluegill?context=user



And McKenzie's runner up, 2 ounces shy.... courtesy of his granddaughter, Christine Arnold: http://bigbluegill.com/photo/christine-arnold?context=user


Most curious indeed, eh?

I think I'd give up taxidermy if my work was that bad.

Unfortunately you can't determine anyrthing by the anatomy or colors of a fish after it's mounted. Both can and usually are changed by poor taxidermy work.

That said is it truly known they aren't hybrids?

Excellent points Tony. I think there is more to this than a favorable environment and lack of competition.

Case in point: I haven't been able to grow a sixteen inch yellow perch since I caught one out of the pond in 2005. Regardless of plenty of feed and favorable conditions, it hasn't happened. They seem to peak out in the 14 to 15 inch range. My theory is it was a genetic anomaly and the same goes for those two bluegills.

For what it's worth a knowlegeable grower told me it's all about lack of stress for producing the really big bruiser bluegills.

I doubt we'll ever know for certain, Cecil. And with the coloration and specific features being subject to the skill and interpretation of the taxidermist doing the work, it's hard to say.
I do find certain elements of both fish to be interesting, but then again the world record fish was certified as a bluegill. And, both descendants are justifiably proud of their father's and grandfather's catches, and I certainly don't wish to take anything away from either achievement. Remarkable on all counts.

If I recall right Ketona's lakes used to also hold the state record Green Sunfish in Alabama many years ago. What ever is going on there makes for some record size pan fish.
For some reason limestone rock makes great biological reefs. I figured this out many years ago in the ocean. Still today I fish a lot of Limestone / Live bottom.

We do know a minimal hardness/ alkalinity is needed for phytoplankton production right?

Ironically koi producers tout a ph under 7.0. I know that's not exactly hardness or Ph, but typically alkaline waters are also hard.

Good explanation Eric!

My theory on why exceptionally large record fish come out of certain waters is the fish population has all the prerequisites to grow large fish, as in little intraspecies competition for whatever reason, abundant food supply to allow maximum growth from the get go, AND an exceptional big fish gene(s) that not only allows exceptionally robust growth, but perhaps simultaneously a longer life span.

These exceptionally large fish are not caught very often due to not only the rarity of the gene(s), but if a fish is carrying that gene(s), the odds of it surviving are quite low due to fishing pressure or just survival odds in general. So most of the time a fish carrying that gene never survives to be galiath of his species.

In a body of water that is either quite large or not exploited the odds are better this gene(s) carrying fish will show up when it does make it to large size.

The interesting thing about fish evolution is faster growing and large fish are favored as they can grow larger faster to escape predation, but we are our own worst enemy if we want consistently large fish, as those are the ones we prefer to harvest.

i would bet there was an abundant food source for the bg that was never discovered. living things don't grow large without food. sure wish i knew what it was!

So you're saying it's all about the food and there aren't other factors?

Yes there are several factors some of which are related. Food is key but so is survival , competition , genetics and water quality. Its not always the most aggressive fastest growing fish that get big. They are often eaten early on when they take risks. Fastest growing fish also don't always keep up a fast growth rate as noted in TPWD's 17 year study of LMB.

When it comes to these BG it's just like any other animal. Deer, Bear, heck even humans. What was said above could very well be said for the Whitetail Deer. There are some monsters out there but you don't see them every year or could go years without killing one. Due to the fact of public pressure and just life in general for the deer. A lot of trophy size deer never make it to trophy size cause a lot of them are killed by age 2 or 3. Just like a lot of BG are killed or fished out before they are giant size!

RC

Very true but I think we're talking not just big or trophy size we are talking serious big rare as heck anomalies. At least that is my take. There has to be something more than just the right conditions etc.

Here is something else you may be interested in. It is a much better story on McKenzie's catch. I will link a good read to the whole story on the bottom.

Bluegill Size Factors

Two record fish in three years from one small pond does seem odd. Alabama Fisheries experts wondered what made the Ketona bluegills so big. So they went over for a look. In an October, 1979 Outdoor Life article on the record bluegill written by John Phillips, Barry Smith, then Assistant Chief of Fisheries for Alabama, noted: "There are two lakes at Ketona, a small lake where the world records were taken and a larger lake that is also supposed to have nice bluegills. But because of the steep banks, the little lake was the only one we could get into."

"We tried shocking and other tactics to collect some of the big bluegills, but all we could come up with were average-sized fish. The Department wanted some of the Ketona Lake bluegills because we had reasoned that the genetic makeup of these fish might be such that they would foster larger bluegills than we were currently producing at out state hatchery."

Such turned out not to be the case. Environmental factors, and WW II which took some fishing pressure off the fish, seemed to make the difference at Ketona Lake. Scale checks of McKenzie's bluegill showed it to be nine years old. That is three years older than most experts calculated as a maximum age attainable for a bluegill at that time.

Limestone waters like Ketona's help grow bigger fish too. As always with panfish, overpopulation, stunting and competition with a large age class will keep sizes down. In small Ketona Lake there were huge numbers of bass to eat smaller bluegills and extremely limited spawning areas for bluegills on small limestone ledges. So few bluegills hatched, and most of those became bass food.

The common situation, which pulls most of the bass out of bass and panfish waters until panfish take over, didn't obtain. Locals hadn't figured out how to catch the bass in this suburban Birmingham lake.

According to Coke McKenzie, "The company that bought the site drew down the ponds after Fish and Game did their study, but Ketona Lake filled back up. Now you can't get permission to fish. Kids still tell me that they sneak in and bring out 2- to 3-pound bluegills all the time. So I guess you could still set a record, if you could get in to fish. With all the fancy gear they have now, somebody might break Hudson's record."

You get the impression McKenzie wouldn't mind being number three on the list, if Hudson were dropped down to number two. It's being second, answering questions about the "second best" bluegill for generations that McKenzie regrets. That, and the hours his "5-pound" bluegill shrank in the refrigerator.

http://www.finefishing.com/1freshfish/aaspecies/panfish/bgillrec.htm

What about the current situation in lake Havasu, and those giant RES? The "old" world record was set in 2011 with a 5.5 lb fish, now we see this 5.8 lb specimen that might claim the title....both from the same BOW?

In addition, there have been quite a few 4-5 lb RES pulled from this lake in the last few years. Sure, there are the Quagga's, but are there other factors in play here also?

Tony,

As I said in my one post, large body's of water have an advantage IMO. That is, due to the large fish population it's more likely the rare gene will show up AND there is more of a chance the fish with thise genes won't be so readily removed from the gene pool or population. Add to that an excellent food supply and year around growth you have the recipe for monster fish, not just big fish.

This is the same advantage of smaller body's water that are unexploited and with other optimum conditions.

I respectfully disagree with Eric on one thing: I believe the world class fish of once in a century or more have genetics that allow fast growth AND longevity.

BTW did you know when anglers were't as sophiticated and able to harvest bluegills as efficiently I have a biological survery done by a couple of professors that say the average size of bluegills in Maxinkuckee Lake was 14 inches. The survey was done at the turn of the 20th century.

14"?? Wouldn't that get the guys over on ice shanty stirred up!

I posted a scanned page there or at fishfinder. Don't think I got much of a response.