I caught this fish the last morning of the fish-in thinking greensunfish x bluegill, other opinions.
Looks like a nice sized Red Ear Sunfish to me. They get dark like that and the fins kind of ratty after spawning.
Jim Smith
I agree with my neighbor here. Shellcrackers get just about black at times.
I vote straight Green Sunfish. Biggun!
Here’s another picture of the same fish…
Here’s a redear I caught saturday afternoon…
My opinion is bluegill/green sunfish hybrid… but that doesn’t mean I’m right.
Hybrid. I’ve never seen a redear with yellow on the fins like a green sunfish. The mouth isn’t big enough to be a “pure” greenie…
Whatever it is, that is a huge one Steve.
Green Sunfish / Bluegill Hybrid. You can usually tell when you get one on the line…they seem to fight a lot harder than either parent species. I love those fish!
I’ve got a pond here in the neighborhood that was stocked with those little fellers. Definitely a green/bluegill cross.
I caught a couple of greenies, they were longer and thinner with a bigger mouth. Almost look like a LMB/BG cross.
Zac-- That redear looks like there might be a bluegill in the family tree somewhere as well. Looks like you photoshopped the back of a bluegill (check out the dorsal fin) onto the bottom half of a redear. Also the gillflap is redear shaped but bluegill colored. Nice fish, though either way.
Entirely possible! I’ll look into it… I haven’t caught enough redears to really know what I’m talking about.
Which did it taste like?
Ed
A valid criteria, Ed, and one that should be tested at every opportunity.
A few points of comparison:
Bluegill:
Green Sunfish:
Redear Sunfish:
Looking at these guys, you can see the hybridization in the examples Steve and Zac have presented.
It looks like what the fish hatchery guy sells as Tiger Bluegills. They are some kind of a cross-breed, and very popular for stock ponds around here.
What ever it is, it without a doubt has some Warmouth (green sunfish) in it. The orange at the tips of the fins is only seen in them, but if it were pure, it would have a much larger mouth.Also, granted its a large one, the back still would not be that high, which looks much more indicitive of a bluegill. i’d bet money that its a warmouth/bluegill cross.
My vote is for a bluegill/green sunfish hybrid. It has the shape of a gill but the larger mouth of a greenie. Nice fish!
Gig-- tigers are bluegill green crosses. They get the size and profile of the bluegill and the bloodyminded attitude from the greens. What a combination!
They are everywhere on the Hiawassee River (Tn.). They really like my new Mormon Cricket pattern.
A marine biologist I work with has told me that in waters with both greens and gills, you can expect about 2% of the total population to be hybrids. He didn’t know how redears would affect the mix.