No sooner than I say I have rarely seen in my pond CNBGxRES hybrids and I catch two in a row of what I think are BGxRES and most likely CNBGxRES (because that is the mix that was in my sediment pond where lots of hybrids were created, transferred to my main pond, where these 4 fish were caught).
So the pics below are not RESxGSF, what this thread is about, but I thought it would be interesting to post the pictures to see the contrast. All fish pictured below were caught today and I got pics of both sides of each fish for better identification.
The first two fish are what I believe are CNBGxRES (or could be RESxCNBG - male of the cross usually stated first). No guarantees and I will be interested to hear what the experts say. I will give my reasoning and what I see and they can agree or disagree.
The first four pictures are of the two alleged CNBGxRES. Here is what I see that makes me believe they are that cross. 1. There is a translucent margin on the opercular tab. Cant remember for sure but I think it was Bill Cody that said a pure BG will always have a solid opercular. No margin. If that is so, the translucent margin indicates this fish is a hybrid if a person believes it has BG genetics involved. 2. I see no GSF genetics in the fish. No large mouth, no green bars below the eyes, relatively long pectoral fin. 3. What I do see below the eye and opercular tab is the yellow mottled patch that is on about 3/4 of my RES and is not a characteristic of any of my BG. 4. orange-ish translucent border on the opercular tab. That could be a characteristic of a GSF, but in this case there are no other GSF characteristics so the orange could come from RES genetics. 5. Could it be a RES with just a poorly defined red/orange tab? Possibly but the top of the fish has bright blue/purple that is very characteristic of some of my CNBG but never my RES. 6. The possible genetics in my ponds are BG, CNBG, RES and GSF. I have never seen, to my knowledge, any other sunfish species that stood out as being different than the mentioned four. Therefore by the characteristics I see and process of elimination I deem the first 4 pictures of two fish to be either RESxBG or BGxRES.
Fish 3 and four are just what I consider to be normal CNBGxGSF HBG. They could be northern BGxGSF but the probability is much higher that it is CNBG genetics because nearly all of my hybrids came from my sediment pond and CNBG is what was stocked along with RES in that pond with a few GSF from unknown source providing the GSF portion of the HBG. I put the regular HBG in there for comparison. They are nice fish, fillet out well and I like them. The first two fish went back in the pond. The HBG went to the holding pen to be invited to dinner.
Edit: the translucent opercular tab border is not very pronounced in the picture for fish #2 but if you look closely you can see it. It was very evident in person. Funny I caught the first two fish back to back in the same area.
