Can you help me id this fish. I don't have a lot of experience and trying to learn.. This comes from a small 1/3 acre pod that was stocked with cat fish and just recently some hybrid blue gill. I found some "volunteer" green sunfish before, not sure if this are just younger green sunfish or something else!..
OK, where is all this fish coming from!.. The pond was completely dry when I bought the property. I have only added catfish and just recently some hybrid bluegill. Now I have some green sunfish and gambusia.
Its possible that the fish you stocked were contaminated with mosquitofish also know as Gambusia affinis. Hybrid bluegill are mixed Green sunfish and Bluegill and are 90% male and typically can breed and eventually they revert back to Green sunfish over a course of many years. Birds also may have carried over fish eggs on their feet but typically that's not the case.
Its possible that the fish you stocked were contaminated with mosquitofish also know as Gambusia affinis. Hybrid bluegill are mixed Green sunfish and Bluegill and have around 90% sterile but 10% typically can breed and eventually they revert back to Green sunfish over a course of many years. Birds also may have carried over fish eggs on their feet but typically that's not the case.
My problem with the bird carrying fish egg theory is this:
If the eggs are sticky enough to stick to the birds feet, how do they become unstuck?
Will the eggs dry out during flight?
If the eggs aren't sticky, how do they make it? I can't see a bird flying with an egg pinched between two toenails.....
If there was ANY high water events where there was 1/2" or 1" of water on top of the ground, the fish could have just swam to the pond.
Definitely a common Gambusia Affinis. They somehow get into a pond from any nearby watershed they inhabit, as will green sunfish, given enough time. Gambusia are live bearers like guppies, and can serve as a minor forage fish for small LMB and larger BG, but they commonly stay in VERY shallow water, up in the grass, if available, and have their fry there, so they survive better than fathead minnows (FHM).
Its of course not likely but it does happen. We have corn fields around my house that get flooded by rain every year which pools of water. One year I noticed minnows swimming in one of the pools. There was no running water anywhere around. Here where I live it is completely flat. Fish can also be dispersed by being dropped in a body of water. I don't believe mosquito fish eggs are adhesive though.
...My problem with the bird carrying fish egg theory is this:
If the eggs are sticky enough to stick to the birds feet, how do they become unstuck?
Will the eggs dry out during flight?
If the eggs aren't sticky, how do they make it? I can't see a bird flying with an egg pinched between two toenails..... ......
My personal favorite scenarios are, in second place, a King Fisher intentionally brought small fish to the pond to stock it for his future use and .......#1 favorite.....a GBH barfed up live fish into the pond!
Those are not only mosquito fish (Gambusia) but all were female Gambusia. Adult males are more smaller and slender bodies very similar shape to male guppies. Also FYI to all Gambusia do not lay eggs. The young are born-released alive as active swimming individuals.
Last edited by Bill Cody; 04/14/1608:11 PM.
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sailfin mollies are native. They are natural colored unlike the pet store domesticated varieties. They make good pond additions IMO.
You probably have them in canals or ditches near you. They are very abundant around coastal areas with brackish or salt waters ditches and canals. if you can collect a few they will do great in your pond. they get pretty good sized too.
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I will tell you about the gams @ my property have taken up residence in every little pool of water all over my land. I mean, every little spot of water that is 3 or so inches in depth. I never noticed all of them before this year, but now they are all over the place. I have thought about high water from rains this year, but last year we had more rain, especially here in E. Texas, so why all the gams this year. I have no idea on how they showed up this year over last year.
Tracy
Last edited by TGW1; 04/15/1608:14 AM. Reason: sp
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Urmetz, you seem to be positive that fish eggs transfer by other creature, animal, or bird and thus stock other bodies of water. How can you be sure when there is so much evidence to contrary, some of this evidence having been presented above?
We all can have our opinions, but the only confirmed way to get hitchhikers into your pond is by intentional stocking. Either a friendly individual trying to do a favor and bucket stocking, or by you unintentionally putting them in with wanted stocker fish as Bobby shows above. These can be confirmed because they can be witnessed and proven.
If you believe strongly that kingfishers carried them to you and dropped them in, or that a fish eating bird happened to burp them in the pond at the right time, then that leads you to many more hard to grasp and hard to prove theories such as the eggs made it through the GI tract of a passing eagle and somehow hatched, or that eggs were really toad eggs but evolved into gambusia.
There always is healthy debate about this topic and I think that debate should continue, but until we can really observe the event happening, we really shouldn't insist that a ridiculous explanation has to be the correct one.
I'll be the first to say that we don't understand all there is to know about nature and how it works. I'm sure if I lived in the days when the earth was 'known' to be flat I would have wondered if that was true too. But until someone observed it to be round, they simply just didn't know...
You never can be too careful when stocking tiny fish and a thorough sorting is a must.
Fish are not dispersed by being dropped into a body of water, except for those intentionally dropped by airplane into remote bodies of water as part of a fish stocking program.
I will tell you about the gams @ my property have taken up residence in every little pool of water all over my land. I mean, every little spot of water that is 3 or so inches in depth. I never noticed all of them before this year, but now they are all over the place. I have thought about high water from rains this year, but last year we had more rain, especially here in E. Texas, so why all the gams this year. I have no idea on how they showed up this year over last year.
Tracy
Tracy:
They could have only been a few pair per puddle last year, and after reproducing numerous times now they are easy to see.
If you look back at my original comment I stated that most likely the Gambusia were accidentally stocked with the desired fish. I also stated that there of course is the possibility of birds transporting eggs etc. and I stated that this is rarely ever the case. The odds are slim to none however do I believe has this ever happened before in history, yes I do. There are numerous shore birds around the world and they often times wade around bodies of water. If lets say heron steps in a shallow nest of green sunfish which by the way green sunfish often times nest extremely close to shore. Ps green sunfish usually lay several thousands of eggs. The heron then flys off with eggs attached to its feathers, feet, etc. and goes to a near by body of water and the eggs splash off the body of the heron when landing in water. This is why I don't understand how hard it is to believe that this could happen. I also never talked about a kingfisher grabbing a fish and dropping into water. Furthermore I did not ever mention eagles digesting eggs and the eggs somehow hatch after being digested. I never also stated that this was the case but instead just listed as example.
In this case, I think it was probably from a high water event, as we have several last year. The hybrid bluegill were stocked this past weekend and the gambusia and green sunfish were there before. Also, I did check the catfish when stocked and there were only catfish looking fish on it!, granted I'm no expert and could have missed them. There are a couple of ponds above mine, across a road, it is possible that the road flooded enough for the fish to get into my pond. I guess I'll be adding a predator fish soon. Thinking off some HSB or maybe LMB...
Hybrid bluegills are not 90% sterile. Just sayin'.
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If we accept that: MBG(+)FGSF(=)HBG(F1) And we surmise that: BG(>)HBG(F1) while GSF(<)HBG(F1) Would it hold true that: HBG(F1)(+)AM500(x)q.d.(=)1.5lbGRWT? PB answer: It depends.
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