Pond Boss Forums STOCKING A NEW POND Types of fish to choose Tennessee reservoir strain smallmouth?

That depends on how far down the gene strand you go. Different studies show historic differences for SMB over geologic time.
My guess is there is local adaptation in SMB in the lower Tenn river system but they are not a strain or subspecies. I would guess that some of those fish were caught locally and are used by small producers.

Keep in mind that there were no reservoirs on the Tenn River system until about 100 years ago. That is like one second on the genetic time clock for family Centrarchidae .

This should help on the time periods involved. From The Cutting Edge - No. 8

Here is the basic story. Millions of years ago peninsular Florida was, like it is today, connected to the mainland. Bluegill were present all over the eastern US. Sea level rose and peninsular Florida was cut off by the sea from the mainland creating two separate populations. Bluegill on both the mainland and on the peninsula continued to evolve separately each influenced by local conditions with a divergence time of roughly 2.3 million years. After a few million years of this separate path sea level fell and the two land masses were connected again. However the two bluegill sub-species were now a little different genetically. The rivers were connected and the two subspecies migrated and integrated in a zone along the deep southeast where the two sub-species mixed. If this sounds familiar it should – it’s the same story as the Florida Largemouth Bass and the Northern Largemouth Bass where the divergence time between Northern (M. salmoides) and Florida (M. floridanus) bass is approximately 2.8 million years.