some of cheyenne's and George's fish look to be ready to spawn. Do the females actually develop eggs in ponds? When would they normally spawn? White bass very early. What about wipers and stripers?
Yes, the females develop eggs in ponds. Fewer than 50% are females however. My experience is that it's somewhere between 15 and 25%. The female hybrid striped bass go through a strange ritual when they're ready to lay eggs, and this is true in both ponds and reservoirs. They will just kind of randomly find an area near a rocky shoreline, or windblown point, then they'll go to the surface and start swimming in kind of slow circles. The males will then gather around her and swim around her in bigger circle in a kind of frenzy.
Another interesting fact is that when we catch hybrids in reservoirs in the spring we generally catch the males and females together. The females are almost always clustered together, and almost always turn on and off as a group in regards to angling susceptibility.
Holding a redear sunfish is like running with scissors.
