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Relative weight chart for bluegills.

Relative weight, sometimes abbreviated as simply "Wr", is a reference to how much a bluegill should weigh for a particular length.

If you look at all bluegill in a particular region of the country, the fish that would be at the 75th percentile, or bigger than three out of four fish is given the designation of Wr 100.

Therefore, if you catch a fish that is 10% heavier than the 75th percentile bluegill for your region, your fish will be given a designation of Wr 110.

Quite honestly, if you're catching bluegill with Wr's in the 90's, these are pretty healthy fish because they're still bigger than average, which would be about the 50th percentile.

I'd like to see a lot of www.bigbluegill.com members familiarize themselves with this particular system. It is helpful for biologists in determining what's going on in a body of water to know the relative weights. High relative weights generally mean that the overall population of a particular species has abundant forage, and probably a better potential to achieve high weights. If you want BIG BLUEGILL, you want them to have high relative weights or Wr's throughout their lifespan.

Here's the chart, and I apologize to those of you who are "metrically challenged".

And now....Thanks to Big Bluegill member Jesse Schertzer, we have an English Units table for to play with. Somebody out there go catch a bluegill, and get a weight and length, and we'll use this chart to show a Wr value!

Thanks, Jesse!

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Comment by Bruce Condello on October 7, 2008 at 9:27am: OK, that's helpful. Thanks for the information.

Comment by Zig on October 7, 2008 at 8:52am: Update:
This is the response I received from our local fisheries manager:

"Having just checked a recent fisheries statistics text book it indicated that the "standards" that you have referenced are the same across a species' geographical range."

Comment by Zig on October 7, 2008 at 5:55am: It seems as if I'm faced with a large wall to scale:
00bluegill_overview.htm

I've been in touch with our local fisheries manager to see if I can gain any information as to what they use to do their evaulations in regards to Wr.
I'm not expecting much - as I was pretty much told, "Thanks for trying out" when I asked a few pointed questions when I started aging the fish I was catching.

Comment by Bruce Condello on October 6, 2008 at 9:00pm: I've checked around and even though technically it is a regional relative weight, I can't find any other charts. So I guess bluegill must be pretty uniform throughout the country in regards to expected weight/length ratio.

Comment by Zig on October 6, 2008 at 8:23pm: Postage scale - set to ounces. Live fish, set in bowl that has been weight tared to zero on the scale.

There are times it takes a few attempts, as certain fish have the unique ability to contort rapidly at the mere sighting of a bowl wall.

Comment by Bruce Condello on October 6, 2008 at 8:09pm: I think your math is right, Zig. I'm interested in knowing how you weigh your fish.

Comment by Zig on October 6, 2008 at 8:07pm: Ok, let's see if I have this correct.
I have five(5) specs.:
8", 6.0ozs = 88 Wr (relative weight)
8", 4.9ozs = 72 Wr
8.25", 6.1ozs. = 81Wr
8.5", 6.5ozs. = 74Wr
9", 8.2ozs. = 80Wr

Is my math correct?
You mentioned "regions"; are there different charts for different regions?

Comment by Bruce Condello on September 26, 2008 at 11:42am: The lower of the two charts, in English units shows a 7.5 inch bluegill to have a weight of 5.4 ounces to achieve relative weight 100.

4.2 divided by 5.4 equals a relative weight of...

78

Not incredibly skinny, but sounds like it could use some extra groceries.