Treat bluegills like a trophy
COBB - Kal Larson of Brookfield cast a tiny jig and wax worm toward the weed bed and watched his bobber settle. Before the rings on the lake’s surface could disappear, the float wiggled and dipped beneath the water.
Larson lifted and reeled; his ultralight spinning rod arched deeply to the weight of a lively fish.
If you inverted the shape of the rod, it matched the expression on his face.
“Could never get tired of this,” Larson said. “Some fish, these bluegills.”
The fish, about an 8-inch female bluegill, was especially plump across its belly.
Larson and I knew it was gravid, or full of eggs.
It also was in the upper size class of bluegills in any Wisconsin lake.
For both reasons, it was not a keeper. It was a catch-and-releaser.
Within seconds, Larson had unhooked the fish and returned it to the clear waters of Blackstone Lake.
Bluegills are one of the most abundant and widely distributed fish species in Wisconsin and many other states. Just don’t call it common. The fish occupies a special place in most angling lives. Think about it: What was the first fish you caught? What fish have you caught most?
The answer for many of us is bluegill.
For those reasons, and more, anglers should practice selective harvest on bluegills to help protect the population of the largest fish and improve the size structures on most lakes.
Dozens of studies have shown bluegills and other panfish are getting hammered by year-round fishing pressure.
Panfish are the most caught fish in Wisconsin, according to a statewide mail survey conducted by the Department of Natural Resources.
Of the 88 million fish anglers reported catching in Wisconsin in the 2006’07 license year, roughly two-thirds (57.7 million) were panfish.
Significantly, panfish also are the most kept fish. Anglers reported keeping 25.7 million (45%) of the panfish they caught.
The result is a declining size structure of bluegills in Wisconsin waters.
If anything is to change, anglers will have to change their habits and start releasing more, if not all, big bluegills.
Is the bluegill worthy of the same respect as largemouth bass and muskellunge? I think so.
So does William Shogren, author of several angling books who lives in Eden Prairie, Minn. and often fishes in Wisconsin.
Shogren has made a study of bluegills. He refers to the fish as “noble.”
“I use flies with barbless hooks, and I practice catch and release on the largest sunfish,” Shogren said. “Respectable keepers for me are just under 7 inches. The mantra should be this: Snap a picture of the big breeders, return them to the water, and keep the medium-sized for the platter.”
Early summer is one of the most critical times to restrict harvest of big bluegills. As the fish spawn, adult males — sometimes called “bulls” — guard the nests.
These fish are extremely vulnerable to angling pressure and will often hit any fly, jig or bait tossed near them.
In a week or two of fishing, a relatively high percentage of the largest bluegills on a lake can disappear.
Daniel Coble of the Wisconsin Cooperative Fishery Research Center at UW-Stevens Point published a paper in 1988 titled “Effects of Angling on Bluegill Populations: Management Implications” in the North American Journal of Fisheries Management.
Coble combed the scientific literature for panfish studies. He stated unequivocally that “angling commonly affects populations of bluegills.”
Angling can have a remarkably quick impact on panfish populations, too. Coble noted that in Mill Lake in Michigan and Mid Lake in Oneida County — lakes that were closed to fishing for many years — within three days of opening, anglers had removed 13% of the bluegills 6 inches or longer.
And after one month (May), 35% of the bluegills 6 inches or longer were removed from Mid Lake.
After three years, Mid Lake had the same size structure of panfish as an adjacent lake that had been continuously open to angling.
Coble concluded: “Because angling affects populations, management steps to reduce angling mortality of larger fish, as well as to reduce density of small fish, seem desirable.”
Last week Larson and I were treated to a chamber of commerce day in early June.
Dozens of other boats and anglers plied Blackhawk Lake, a 212-acre manmade waterbody near Cobb in Iowa County. It has a maximum depth of 42 feet.
Most of the boats fished the shallows, targeting bluegills.
The fish, however, were not yet on beds but were staging offshore.
We anchored the boat over 15 feet of water and cast to the deep weed edge, which was in about 10 to 12 feet.
We used slip bobber rigs to present the bait within a foot or two of the bottom.
The fish provided us constant action.
Larson and I used a 1/32 or 1/64 ounce jig head with a soft plastic tail and a wax worm to catch most of the fish.
Many of the fish hit before the bait had completed its fall.
If a few seconds passed and the bobber hadn’t assumed its upright position, it was usually because a panfish had already sucked in the lure.
The catch included several dozen bluegills, about a dozen black crappies and one yellow perch.
The bluegills ranged from 3 to 9 inches in length.
We released all but 13 bluegills, which Larson said is a perfect meal for his four-member family.
The average size of the fish we kept was probably a tad under 7 inches.
Will such a fish make a smaller fillet than an 8 or 9-incher? Of course.
Will keeping the smaller panfish and releasing the larger one help improve the fishery over the long haul? Absolutely.
Larson and I spent a splendid five hours on the lake, catching fish at each of five spots we tried. Based on the outing, the lake’s panfish size structure appeared average for southern Wisconsin.
Along the way we were entertained by muskrats in the nearshore waters and eastern phoebes in the air.
The birds did plenty of catching, too. They flitted out over the water to grab insects, then back to shoreline perches where they gobbled their prey.
Larson and I had the luxury of doing far more releasing than keeping.
As the bluegill spawning season hits its peak around the state, think about giving the fish on the beds a break and treating the biggest bluegills like the trophies they are.
Selective harvest by anglers helps improve size structures