Pond Boss Forums INTRO Questions & Observations No eggs in BG

Well our water temps hit 70 yesterday. The bass are on the bed, Man this is my favorite time of the year. I had the oppertunity to do some BG fishing the past few days in some other ponds and when I cleaned them they are full of eggs but this weekend I caught and cleaned about 20 from my pond and none had eggs, I found this odd. Whats up with this? Both of the other lakes I fished were within 15 minutes from my house and again the BG were full of eggs. I no I didnt catch all males.

Jake

Big Jake :

A number of possibilities , 1 they have spawned already , 2 they were immature ,3 they were males ( with female colors) ,4 or others. Have you seen males on the beds yet this year? What about small fry swimming around ? How long have your water temps. been 70 ? Are the fish in good condition?

All the fish were from a half pound up to a pound so they are not immature. They are in great shape. My water temps until this week have been high 50s low 60s so I dont think they spawned out yet. I have not seen any males on the bed. I did throw a cast net checking to see how many thread fin I could catch and I did catch some very small BG about a inch in lenght. I found that odd also as last years fish should have been bigger than that. I dont see how they could have spawned already.

Big Jake :

Bob reported at the Ga. meeting (early Feb.) that he had shocked up some this years yoy BG in Jan. Those BG would now be 60 days old at least and could be 1in. We had some real warm days in Jan/Dec. We have small BG of all lengths right now from 1/8in new swim up fry to 2in that were spawned late Sept. Look at this link for pics. from last fall. The real small ones are now 2in.

http://www.pondboss.com/ubb/ultimatebb.php?ubb=get_topic;f=7;t=000290;p=1#000000

While we have some new yoy BG a major spawn has not occurred yet. Temps. 70 at surface 65 at 3 ft. I think a major BR/RES spawn will occur in our ponds in the next 2 weeks.


Here is a link to a spawning post I started yesterday.

http://www.pondboss.com/ubb/ultimatebb.php?ubb=get_topic;f=7;t=000307;p=1#000000

Did you catch the fish in one area that was deep ? If so you might have found a group of females that are not ready to spawn but will spawn in June. It may just be a odd situation. You sure these are not HBG?

Eric, All of the fish came from depths of 5 to 8 feet. They were actually all caught off the bottom.I think, as you have stated that I may have found a group of females that are not ready to spawn. If this is the case when would I begin to see eggs in the females that will spawn in June? I am going to try to catch some in shallow water and see if they have eggs. If they do this will verify what you have said. I will let you no. Thanks for the great info.

Jake

Jake we see bluegill this time of year that are an inch or even less that are from the last spawn in Sept. Although they are almost 6 months old they have at this point had 2 months of growing at most. So I think if they are 1 inch or so they are the last spawn last summer. Now if you see them in amonth at an inch that is diff story b/c they start growing like crazy when temps hit 70. How are the shad?

Greg, I am amazed at how the TF have done. As we have discussed I beleive placing the fertile adults in the 2 to 4 inch range in the pond last year was the secret instead of thumbnail sizes. I can walk around the pond with a throw net and every cast yields 10 to 20 shad. Best of all my RW are at almost 100%, up from 75% last year prior to the shad. Water just hit 68 to 70 down here. Just added liquid 10-34-0 so I hope I can get a bloom, I always have problems establishing a bloom. Added 5 gallons to 2.5 Acres. My Alk is 25. I will let you no how it goes.

Jake

Big Jake :

I had to check on your question about when would you see eggs in BG 2 mths from spawning.

I found no direct answer to the question but here is some info which will help. This source cited an article on BG oocyte and gonadal development which I don't have acces to.This study used GSF but stated the results were similar to what was observed in BG.

--------------------------------------------
In contrast to the males, experimental
studies have shown that spring-spawning fe -
males have shown a more consistent pattern of
requirements for both long photoperiods and
elevated water temperatures for stimulating
advanced stages of oocyte maturation.
Sexual differences within species have also
been described with different photoperiod or
temperature requirements for spermatogenesis
and for maturation of oocytes.

In a descriptive study of a closely
related species Lepomis macrochirs, James
(1946) describead period of gonadal quiescence du
ring the winter followed by a period
of active gametogenesis in the spring, concomitant with the seasonal increases in day length and temperature. This latter suggestive
relationship was the subject of this investigation, with Lepomis cyanellus...

This is in
agreement with the relationship observed in
nature where rapid gametogenesis occurs only
after water temperatures have greatly increased
(to about 18-20 C) from winter levels
and under photoperiods which have increased
to about 14 hr and are continuing to increase.

Specimens captured in midwinter
and subjected to a long photoperiod high
temperature (20 C) combination initiated
gonadal recrudescence and within 28 days attained the gonosomatic values,
oocyte diameters, and testicular histology
of functionally mature fish.

Again, the long photoperiod-
high temperature combination produced
mature gonads in both sexes by the first sampling date, 21 days in this experiment.

Based on this I would make a "wild guess" and say you should see ripe eggs by at least, around 21 days after the female fish are holding in water 60-68 degrees and with a photo period of 14 hrs. For what it is worth. The fish that were holding deep will probably move shallow soon and 21-28 days later will be ripe with fully developed eggs and be ready to spawn.

Eric, again great info, you sure do come up with some great answers for off the wall questions. I will be checking them again in a couple weeks and let you no.

Jake

Big Jake :

Thanks and good luck. Let me know what you find out as I would like to know the results also.