What cannibalism in fish farms can teach us about catching bigger bass

Big fish eat small fish. The entire sport of angling is based on this natural fact. If predatory fish had survived in any other way, people like Lauri Rapala and Fred Arbogast would never have become icons. And considering how much the angling industry thrives on the sale of artificial bait, angling probably wouldn’t be as popular as it is today.

But the fish food chain does much more than just sell bait. A healthy, balanced ecosystem—one in which you have a legitimate chance of catching a trophy—can only exist if the big fish eat just the right number of the little fish. Take all the big fish out of the equation and, in many cases, you ruin the potential of a body of water; get rid of all the little fish and, well, the big fish that are left won’t be around for long. This issue is currently making headlines at an Illinois fish hatchery, and it’s an issue that’s both hilarious from a fishing perspective and tells us a lot about how, where, and why we catch bigger bass.

Mix and match

Did you know that large bass have been increasingly found on ice blocks in glass fish market cabinets lately? It seems to fly under the radar of many people, but it is true. It turns out that bass are not only easy to farm in hatcheries and sustainable, but also ask for it at the table is growing. According to this video Overview of a farm in Illinois (above), most of their fish are sold to Canada and around New York City. However, bass farmers in Illinois are losing profits due to a Hannibal Lector-like problem: cannibalism.

According to the story on Kfvs12.comA research team from Southern Illinois University was brought in to help farmers come up with the best plan for separating fish once they’re moved from tanks to large outdoor ponds. The problem is, bass simply don’t all grow at the same rate. Even if you start with all-size fry in a tank, their feeding habits will vary just enough that they won’t all grow at the same rate. This isn’t a big deal at the smaller sizes when they’re confined to tanks, but guess what happens when fish of different sizes meet in those outdoor ponds? Let’s just say there’s a reason the popular “Baby Bass” pattern has been plastered on crankbaits for decades.

The researchers are still working on a separation strategy that doesn’t require farmers to invest in much more space, but in the meantime, as researcher Koaw Zaczek put it, “the product is basically eating itself.” So what does this tell us about catching bigger bass? A lot.

Recognize a stunt

Fishermen like to catch a lot of fish. So the ideal day is to catch a lot of big fish, but for most bass anglers, that’s a rare occurrence. Maybe it happens more often if your home water is Lake Okeechobee, Toledo Bend, Lake Falcon, or Lake Casitas. But if you take a dart at a U.S. map and survey the bass waters in that area—from county park lakes to farm ponds—chances are you’ll find three or four spots packed with bass where a 2-pounder would be a monster. Within 10 miles of my own home in Pennsylvania, I could find half a dozen ponds where I’d catch 20-plus bass on any given day, and none of them would seriously bend my rod. Sound familiar? It’s a product of stunted growth.

Stunting occurs when a closed body of water has too many small fish competing for limited food sources. There simply isn’t enough protein to keep them growing to their full potential. In most cases, there is also a lack of large bass to eat the small bass. Unfortunately, most of the six ponds I mentioned have no large fish because anglers have removed them all. This happens all the time. There is a simple solution, but anglers are largely at a loss when it comes to implementing it.

Find your balance

Not long ago, a college friend contacted me and told me that his parents had just moved to a new neighborhood with a large pond. Although the bass fishing was great, all the fish were small. He wanted to know if I had any advice on catching big fish. “Start killing the little ones,” I said, my tongue sticking out of my cheek.

Of course, we are bound by the law. Sportfish have size and catch limits, but when it comes to popular species like bass, the idea of ​​removing a lot of them to create a better fishery in the long run is not something that every angler likes. I think it’s because too many anglers would rather catch a bunch of fish than a few bigger ones. People also don’t have the patience — the rewards of a culling, even if it’s state-sanctioned, can take years to materialize. Then you still have to hope that the nicer fish that are landed further away go back into the water and not into a bucket, or the cycle starts over again. What I’m not suggesting here is that you go to your local bass pond and start your own future lunker program. What I am suggesting is that if you want to To catch better fish, you need to go to places that are balanced, which often means working harder to get a bite.

Balance equals harmony, and it’s so easy for a system to get out of balance for a plethora of reasons, ranging from fishing pressure to climate change to pollution. In some cases, invasive species can play a role. For example, northern snakeheads are a nuisance to many bass anglers in the Mid-Atlantic and Northeast. There’s no question that they shouldn’t be there and can have a negative impact on a body of water, but I’ve also seen their presence disrupt areas with limited bass populations. Locations where I routinely caught nothing but 1-pound loads or smaller are now producing fewer bass, but more 3-pound loads or larger in the 12 years or so since snakeheads showed up. That’s not to say that invasive species are the answer, but it does illustrate the point that balance produces bigger fish. The snakeheads feed on smaller bass, and the bass feed on the protein-rich snakeheads.

Read more: The best bass fishing rods, tested and reviewed

I guess it depends on whether you like a lot of fish or if you are aiming for big fish. I certainly don’t mind if a big bass of 2.5 kilos occasionally shoots at my frog, in areas where frogs didn’t exist years ago.