What is puzzling is why the small fish like the bubble plume so well. In the summer we would approach the diffuser bubbles on the boat and see small BG riding the bubble plume up from depth then disperse outward. It appeared they were riding the plume over and over, like making a game of it. Maybe they liked the cool water? Or the bubbles? Don't know. Just know it is a common sight during summer around the diffusers.
Puzzle solved...FOOD! Lots of macrophytes and other foods in that plume being brought up.
That makes a lot of sense Rex. It also makes sense after seeing about three schools of what I think are YOY fingerling BG feeding around the dock yesterday. Schools of a couple hundred or so fish were feeding in a ball near the surface off something on the surface. At first I thought they were LMB fry but about the time I get close enough to tell for sure they go under. But I think I saw some vertical stripes on at least some of them so likely BG. Fish are an inch or two long. I suppose one of the schools could have also been LMB because it looked like dark over light bodies. Wish I could have gotten close enough to tell for sure.
But I digress. The reason I brought up these YOY balls of fish feeding on something concentrated on the surface of the water, it would also make sense if the water flow from the aeration was bringing up tiny food in the water boil there would be small fish to take advantage of the food source. Plus some cover from the bubble plume. I've seen what I assume is LMB cause schools of these fish just ripple around the water column and even strikes at the surface. So where the small fish are feeding, the big fish are too.
