bluegill-redear-cross

Comment

Comment by Zach Pierce on March 10, 2011 at 10:41am

I was wanting to here they ate something BG do not, it is almost impossible to keep the GSF or HBG off of a worm.

 

I think we caught a few one time with crawfish, but then again just about all fish will eat them as well.

Comment by Walt Foreman on March 10, 2011 at 10:13am

For bait try red wigglers or nightcrawlers, hooked once through the nose.

Comment by Walt Foreman on March 10, 2011 at 10:12am

If you stocked them as fingerlings, and there's not a lot of cover in your pond, the GSF probably ate them.  They spawn around the same time as bluegill, usually when the water temp gets around 68.  As far as catching them, usually there will be fewer of them in any given pond or lake, and they don't bite as reliably in my experience as bluegill; I usually catch them fishing for bluegill, and almost always with live bait.

 

As to getting them big, they normally don't eat pellet food, so there are two keys: keeping the pond very fertile so that their food supply of invertebrates flourishes, and keeping other fish, such as bluegill, that would compete with them thinned out so there's plenty of food for the shellcracker.

Comment by Zach Pierce on March 10, 2011 at 8:56am

What is the trick to get the shellcrackers to grow and better yet bite?

 

I put some in my pond, probably not too many survived if any but I would like to think at least some did and they will spawn.

 

When do they typically spawn, and when is the best time to fish for them and with what bait?

Comment by Walt Foreman on March 10, 2011 at 8:41am

They were caught from private ponds I was managing at the time.  I don't have any mounted because I never realized a two-pound shellcracker was that big of a deal until recently.  But there is a photo in my photos of an elderly gentleman holding up one that was caught from a four-acre pond I manage; I didn't see the fish in person and the angler was anxious to eat it quickly so it was never weighed, but to me it looks like easily a three-pounder. 

 

I just started two years ago managing that particular lake again after living in CA for ten years (the shellcracker was caught before I moved away), so hopefully in another year or two there will be some hawgs come out of there.  I caught two that were 11" each in fall of 2009, so there should be some pretty big ones caught this year assuming we can get them to bite.

Comment by Greg Wade on March 10, 2011 at 6:53am

Walt,

You mentioned that you've caught Shellcrackers well over two lb's. Were those caught in private ponds, or public waters? 

 

Do you have any mounted?

Comment by Walt Foreman on June 3, 2010 at 12:00pm

I caught a bluegill-shellcracker cross in Mississippi the day before the fish above was caught, which the pond owner, who is a wildlife biologist, estimated at a pound and a half. That's the largest cross I've caught, though I've caught shellcracker well over two pounds. I don't know that they're easier to catch than shellcracker unless they're more numerous. I've caught them on crickets and red wrigglers.

Comment by Zach Pierce on June 3, 2010 at 10:32am

So are these crosses easier to catch than the true Shellcrackers?

What is the largest one of these you have caught?

What do you recomend to catch these guys?

Comment by Walt Foreman on June 3, 2010 at 8:55am

It has the black opercular flap of a bluegill, but some of the coloring is such that I only see in the crosses between bluegill and shellcracker. The other cross that I caught that day, labelled "another bluegill-redear cross," is more obvious in the mixed colorings. This one was obvious to me in person, but perhaps not so much in a photo.

Comment by Zach Pierce on June 3, 2010 at 5:57am

How can you tell this is a BGxRES cross? What type of BG do you think it is crossed with?