Yesterday I went to the Hayden Sportsman's Dock to fish from the dock. I was using a jigging pole with 10 lb test line and tidbits of nightcrawlers and must have caught at least fifty small to medium sized pumpkinseeds within about a hour and a half. That is to be expected and I picked a brightly colored one to go in my tank, and put him in a Ziploc bag. Then I cast out and the bobber zipped down. Expecting a pumpkinseed, I reeled the fish in to discover a shocking find: a coppernose bluegill! You must understand; I've fished this dock for a while and I've never caught ANY bluegills here. Is it typical for bluegills to be outsourced by pumpkinseeds where they occur together or do they just prefer somewhat different conditions? Then after roughly ten more pumpkinseeds and two more blurgills, the line went taut and something trashed at the other end of the line. I reel it in to reveal a five incher smallmouth bass, another species I have never seen or caught here. It and the bluegill go into their own Ziplocs. Then I have the good fortune to pull in a four inch yellow perch, who goes into a waiting Ziploc. These fish are all in my tank now, and my green sunfish is now schooling with the 'gill and the p-seed and the perch and bass switch hiding spots all the time. The smallie just ate a few nightcrawlers along with the greenie, but the other three fish are terrified of the worms, probably because they are in a tank because of them. The smallmouth, when he gets gigantic, will go to either Cabela's in Post Falls or to one of my friend's ponds or a massive 550 gallon tank with another smallmouth bass and two largemouth bass and a hybrid freshwater stingray for company.

Edited by catfish_hunter, 21 September 2009 - 10:33 AM.

a mix of bluegill and pumpkinseed is not too uncommon, but in my experience bluegill often outcompete and replace pumpkinseed in ponds where both occur.

It depends on local food resources. P-seeds prefer mollusks, and bluegills prefer small planktonic food like Daphnia. I could take you to ponds in SE Massachusetts where p-seeds are more numerous and larger than the (exotic) bluegills, which reflects food availability.

I guess it is just a normal phase bluegill after all, and pumpkinseeds eat molluscs? Oh, and bluegill like daphnia? I gave one of my green sunfish daphnia and it went nuts wolfing them down. What about green sunfish preffered prey items?