Redear from yesterday evening and this morning

[redearhoosier]

Stumbled upon some shellcracker that were aggressively guarding their nests. These fish were caught by sight fishing which is a blast!! My son thumped me, but that's good!

[trypman1]

Super fun and with son, congrats!

[GREENFISH]

Glad you found a few with your son!!


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[redearhoosier]

These were unexpected, I thought they were basically done spawning. I had company down from Indiana this past weekend and the bite was not too good. My son and I drove over to a known nesting bank last night and there they were on beds. To say I was shocked would be correct....

There were about two dozen 1lb+ redear furiously defending their beds going in circles warding off intruders. The biggest of the bunch, I estimated him at two pounds, was in the deeper portion of the nests and would not touch my offerings.

[Crappie Dayz]

Which Lake? Those would be fun to catch!


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[redearhoosier]

Barkley

[perchjerker108]

redear, nice catch. I did the same in Hopsons? creek just north of the bridge. Man, largest I've ever caught. Not many, 7, but all were over a pound and a couple near 2 lbs, but never weighed them. Caught the 1st one on a waxworm, and immediately, switched to worms. Wind got up and had to leave to be able to get to where I put in. Many thanks to your advice on previous posts. Lord wiling, I will forget about the Bluegill and target these large Shellcrakers next year. About 1/2 of the larger bluegill we caught were skinny and in poor health. We did catch several Bluegill, but they looked messed up. (Big eyes, skinny body) We ended up throwing a lot of nice size (Length wise) Bluegill back since they were just skin and bones.

[redearhoosier]

I would like to know why the bluegill don't get bigger down here? The redear certainly get serious size to them but not the bluegill. Maybe Kentucky lake actually has a bit better sized bluegill? Interesting situation that I'd like to know more about.

[crp4570]

Congrats on a fine day on the water

[perchjerker108]

redearhoosier, I don't know if the Bluegill are larger at Ky, but I think you catch more at KY. On size, they get to an OK size, my basic limit is 7", but hard to find a 9". Now, If anyone who reads this, let me know about what I saw when cleaning the 'thin' Bluegill I caught on my 1st day, that, after the first day of fishing that I throwed back regardless of size after seeing this. I cleaned about 3, 7" skinny Bluegill on the 1st day. I noticed the meat was 'chaulky white' color, very thin, and not the clear fillet I was used to seeing. I throwed the fillets away. Anyone else ever seen this. Maybe these male bluegill wore themselves out protecting a bed, just don't know.