Right now these fish have no predation and an almost unlimited supply of forage. I'm curious why I'm catching a few BG that are this skinny. I've gotten stockers from a few different places and I'm not sure if it could just be bad genetics?

http://i1373.photobucket.com/albums/ag368/lukkyseven/20140512_185216_zpsb099b15d.jpg

http://i1373.photobucket.com/albums/ag368/lukkyseven/20140512_185234_zps2dab6438.jpg

It's not often that I catch these fish, but when I do I typically remove them from the pond. Am I doing myself any favors here?

I do have fish that are doing well though, so it's not the entire pond. Here's the only example I have a picture of.

http://i1373.photobucket.com/albums/ag368/lukkyseven/Redbreastbelly_zps2edd64ef.jpg

http://i1373.photobucket.com/albums/ag368/lukkyseven/Redbreastchunky_zps91cbec37.jpg

That last photo looks like a Redbreast sunfish, rather than a BG to me?


oops....you already know that!

Yea, I hate to compare one species to another, but I just didn't have any pictures of healthy bluegill from the pond. Only pictures of this redbreast and my pumpkinseeds.

Give them BGs a chance to fatten up on that feed and see what happens. Looks like the redbreast is off to a great start.

Hey LS that top photo looks like a HBG? The mouth on that thing is quite large. Either way both those fish are nice fish. The top one does look a little skinny but looks good otherwise. Maybe there are to many fish for the food availiable? Is that possible not enough to go around maybe? Could just be a growing spurt and it's in-between sizes right now. They look healthy otherwise though. I would just continue to catch some and watch them at this point.

RC

Nothing to me really screams HBG, but I'm not good at identifying them. I doubt it's a food source issue as I can still see swarms of minnows in the shallows.

Like I said, the majority of fish seem to be average or better. Just a select few seem to be skinny like this. It's pretty rare to pull one up, which is why I have been removing them. I guess I could toss them back and give them a shot.

My concern was poor genetics and I didn't want that to be passed on.

Well if you have a lot of them then select harvest of some bad ones is no big deal. You may very well be right just may have got some runts from somewhere??

RC

Are those RBS the ones you got from Zimmerman's? They look real pretty!

Actually CJ I bought pumpkinseeds from Zimmerman. Here's one of them though (more impressive than the RBS if you ask me).

http://i1373.photobucket.com/albums/ag368/lukkyseven/20140506_182846_zps3199300c.jpg