Panfish Identification :)

[fisherman-andy]

I thought this would be a good post on the identification of panfish as from time to time some of us would be confused on what kind of fish we catch.

BLUE GILLS:

PUMKINSEED:

GREEN SUNFISH:

BREAM (HYBRID - most likely a Blue Gill/Green mix but possible with warmouth, long ear, red ear, red breast, pumpkinseed etc)

- Most commonly mistaken for a Blue Gill here in MN

Here are the variances likely mix with pumkins & greens & gills

[fisherman-andy]

More Variances of hybrids:

RED EAR SUNFISH:

WARMOUTH (variances):

[fisherman-andy]

WARMOUTH: (continue)

[fisherman-andy]

And my most favorite panfish the Crappies:

Black Crappie:

White Crappie:

[fisherman-andy]

And the mysterious Blacknose Crappie:

[DTro]

Very cool, thanks!

[itchmesir]

Awesome info!

[mainbutter]

Woah love the stripe down the face of that blacknose!

[ozzie]

where would i find one of those blacknose crappies? those look cool...nice post!!

[fisherman-andy]

where would i find one of those blacknose crappies? those look cool...nice post!!

Unfortunately there is no known blacknose Crappies here in the midwest. If you want a chance to land a Black Nose Crappie you'll have to go South.

Here's some brief info:

Blacknose crappie are a genetic variation of black crappie and not a hybrid of white and black crappie or a subspecies.

Blacknose crappie, which are black crappie that have a black stripe running from the top fin to the tip of the nose, were first described in Ohio in 1957. A later study reported that blacknose crappie had been found in 13 states, including Florida. Today, the only known naturally occurring Florida population of these fish is found in Lake Seminole near the Florida, Georgia, and Alabama borders.

Fish stocking programs may have introduced the blacknose species to other Southern States too due to popularity.

A variant of the Black Nose is the Magnolia Crappie. Here is some info on how Magnolia's are made:

Making Magnolia crappie

The Magnolia crappie is a cross between a male blackstripe crappie and a female white crappie. The blackstripe crappie is a color variant of the black crappie that occurs naturally in low numbers in some Mississippi impoundments. The blackstripe crappie — also called a blacknose crappie — is recognized by a narrow, dark stripe from the dorsal fin forward down the top of the head and continues on the underside of the head to the back of the mouth.

The hybrid offspring of the male blackstripe crappie and the female white crappie retains the black stripe. Using the blackstripe crappie as the male parent instead of a normally colored black crappie allows hybrids produced in the hatchery to be easily recognized.

But hybrid crappie can reproduce, so hybrids don’t accomplish the goal of controlled reproduction needed to effectively manage crappie in small impoundments. But the hatchery scientists have one more trick — they make the crappies triploid.

Crappie, as most fish, have two sets of chromosomes. This is the diploid condition, and diploid fish reproduce normally. Triploid crappie have three sets of chromosomes. Cellular processes necessary to produce viable eggs and sperm break down when there are three sets of chromosomes. It is the triploid condition that prevents the triploid hybrid crappie from producing offspring. The fish produce eggs and sperm and mate, but the fertilized eggs do not develop.

The triploid offspring are produced by stripping eggs from normal female white crappie and fertilizing them with sperm stripped from normal male blackstripe crappie. At exactly five minutes after fertilization, the eggs are put into a pressure chamber and exposed to 8,000 psi of pressure for two minutes. This interrupts the normal cellular processes, and results in the egg retaining an extra set of chromosomes. The fertilized egg, and the offspring that develops from it, have three sets of chromosomes, and cannot produce offspring.

[Chad Peterson]

Great information and very detailed! Good job Andy.

Sniffer

[fisherman-andy]

There may be some confusion between Rock Bass and Warmouths. Remember these species can possibly be breed with other panfish likely causing different variations.

Rock Bass. Colors can vary depending on the waters they come from which may make them look like Warmouths.

Warmouths (can also have variances mix with other panfish species):

Colors can also vary a bit

[MichaelSwan]

Great post Andy, thank yoU!

[Slabasaurus]

Nice post. Particularly the bit about the Warmouth vs Rock Bass

[Vallejo]

Great post and very interesting!! Thanks!!

[Ctrl_Alt_Dlt]

Cool! A few of my pics were used (xxv). Those fish were caught at Blackhawk Lake in Eagan. I go there every summer just to photograph them.

Are there warmouths in WI and MN? A friend of mine claims there are a bunch in a pond in Oshkosh, WI.

[trappingaddiction]

Cool! A few of my pics were used (xxv). Those fish were caught at Blackhawk Lake in Eagan. I go there every summer just to photograph them.

Are there warmouths in WI and MN? A friend of mine claims there are a bunch in a pond in Oshkosh, WI.

Yes, there are some warmouths in Minnesota, but not a ton of them.

[reinhard1]

warmouth's are very aggresive however pretty small. i haven't cought that many over the years but they are here. great pictures and information. good luck.

[Scott M]

In Minnesota, warmouth are primarily found in the extreme southern parts of the Mississippi River and its backwaters.

[fisherman-andy]

Updated to include "Hybrid" Crappie.

Hybrid Crappie (black&white cross)

Alot people mistake this fish for either pure bred White or Black Crappies. Even though it may have some stripe patterns similiar to a White Crappie, however its features & deep colors are more distinct to the Black Crappie IMO. White Crappies are generally very light in color even during spawn.

A White Crappie has 5-6 dorsal fins. Black Crappie has 7-8 dorsal. Hybrid is said to have 7 dorsal fins.

Hybrids typically occur in lakes or rivers that contain both species of Crappies. They are said to grow larger and faster then normal white/black species. From surveys and studies Hybrid Crappies do exist in MN where both species are present in the same body of water.

[bobbymalone]

hybrid crappie are sometimes tough to spot without a DNA test, especially if they aren't first generation hybrids.

i read some high school kids crappie hybridization paper as a MN state science fair judge a couple years ago and they found a considerably higher rate of advanced hybridization than maybe what I would have expected. The work was done in collaboration with one of those fancy private schools in minneapolis and a fisheries scientist at the U.

[fisherman-andy]

hybrid crappie are sometimes tough to spot without a DNA test, especially if they aren't first generation hybrids.

i read some high school kids crappie hybridization paper as a MN state science fair judge a couple years ago and they found a considerably higher rate of advanced hybridization than maybe what I would have expected. The work was done in collaboration with one of those fancy private schools in minneapolis and a fisheries scientist at the U.

Agreed, very difficult to tell when their no longer first generation hybrids. You start to get stripes that only appear in upper portion of the body like a white crappie and mid to lower portion has blotches like a normal black crappie. As to a reason why in my opinion they may end up with features more similiar to a black crappie then a white. Maybe because blacks are more abundant?

[fisherman-andy]

Update again! Thanks to someone bringing this to my attention.

Orange spotted sunfish

[metro fisherman]

Very nice thread here, didnt realize there were that many variants. Caught many of the hybrids in a neighborhood pond by my house as a kid. Does hybridization occur naturally or do lower numbers of fish, be it from winterkill or whatever, lead to more crossbreeding?

[frazwood]

i read some high school kids crappie hybridization paper as a MN state science fair judge a couple years ago and they found a considerably higher rate of advanced hybridization than maybe what I would have expected. The work was done in collaboration with one of those fancy private schools in minneapolis and a fisheries scientist at the U.

It's funny that you mention this. I was one of the science fair judges for this project -- and it was one of the BEST science fair projects that I had ever seen (the fancy school was Breck).

The sad part was science fair disqualified him from the competition because of some technicality, but didn't tell the student until he arrived at the competition. So, he simply stood by his poster for 6 hours, hoping that someone would talk to him (I might have been the only one -- I judged his report prior to the event, not his poster at the event).

In the end, I didn't feel too sorry for him. He was going to Harvard the next year on a full-tuition scholarship. He'll probably be running the world in a year or two.