Javascript Disabled Detected

You currently have javascript disabled. Several functions may not work. Please re-enable javascript to access full functionality.

Juvenile chain pickerel

Started by Guest_Skipjack_* , Jan 03 2007 10:35 PM

Next

Reply to this topic

37 replies to this topic

#1 Guest_Skipjack_*

Guests

Posted 03 January 2007 - 10:35 PM

This guy fooled me for a long time, was certain it was a redfin. They do not get the typical chain pattern until 8 plus inches.

#2 Guest_chad55_*

Guests

Posted 04 January 2007 - 12:12 AM

Uh-oh...So my grass could be a chain...Hope not!

Chad

#3 Guest_choupique_*

Guests

Posted 04 January 2007 - 01:21 AM

A friend of mine has a pair of grass pickerel. A true pair, they spawned in his tank twice this spring, and produced viable eggs.

Anyways, the male looks typical for a monster grass, kind of like a chubby short billed musky. The female on the other hand this more marbled look, and looks a lot like a pike or a chain pickle.

Just thought I would toss that in the mix, since its apparent by these two fish the pattern can be highly variable in large ones. His are are just under a foot long.

#4 Guest_dsmith73_*

Guests

Posted 04 January 2007 - 06:51 AM

Are you certain this is a chain? The snout length looks too short for a chain.

#5 Guest_drewish_*

Guests

Posted 04 January 2007 - 12:25 PM

Are you certain this is a chain? The snout length looks too short for a chain.

It is the same fish that is posted in his SRBD for sale thread.

I will post a pic that Matt sent me recently of the same fish a few months older. Maybe Matt has a better picture.

I will say that I sent Matt this fish ID'ng it as a redfin pickerel. I also have a similar fish that wasn't fed as well as Matt's so it isn't quite that big yet. I will also say that another pickerel I gave Matt is definitely a redfin. The one pictured outgrew it by leaps and bounds and were collected in the same waters around the same time and fed pretty much the same.

#6 Guest_edbihary_*

Guests

Posted 04 January 2007 - 12:48 PM

This fish sure looks to me like the chain pickerel shown here:
http://www.natureser...let/NatureServe
(Click the link and type "pickerel" in the "Search by Name" box.)

To view the images directly, click the following links:
http://www.natureser...mp;NAME=IMG0017
http://www.natureser...mp;NAME=IMG0014

#7 Guest_teleost_*

Guests

Posted 04 January 2007 - 12:50 PM

I'm confused.

Are you saying these fish are the same and the upper photo is the most recent?

I'll admit the the lower photo has the body pattern of a growing chain but with a short snout.
The upper photo sure looks like a redfin/grass to me.

Must be a hybrid :lol:

#8 Guest_drewish_*

Guests

Posted 04 January 2007 - 03:12 PM

I'm confused.
Are you saying these fish are the same and the upper photo is the most recent?

The upper picture is the fish as a juvenile probably around 4-5". The lower picture is a more recent picture of the same fish and Matt says it is close to 12" now.

#9 Guest_Skipjack_*

Guests

Posted 04 January 2007 - 06:07 PM

The upper picture is the fish as a juvenile probably around 4-5". The lower picture is a more recent picture of the same fish and Matt says it is close to 12" now.

Yeah, what Drew said.

I have never seen a confirmed chain in the flesh, so my judgement may not be the best, but both photos are of the same fish, and this fish is double the size of its contemporaries with the same feeding.

#10 Guest_teleost_*

Guests

Posted 04 January 2007 - 10:17 PM

Here's a shot of a small guy (E. niger) from last summer. It was only about 3-4" long.

You can see how my fish here shows that it's snout to eye measurement is greater than it's eye to gill cover.

I don't know whats going on with your fish Skipjack.

#11 Guest_Skipjack_*

Guests

Posted 04 January 2007 - 10:37 PM

Here's a shot of a small guy (E. niger) from last summer. It was only about 3-4" long.

You can see how my fish here shows that it's snout to eye measurement is greater than it's eye to gill cover.

I don't know whats going on with your fish Skipjack.

That makes at least two of us.

#12 Guest_chad55_*

Guests

Posted 04 January 2007 - 10:39 PM

Ummm...three! That is wierd. May sound crazy but is it possible that matt has a hybrid of some sort? Also what do juvi tiger muskie, spotted muskie, northern pike, ect. look like? Maybe we should get some pics for comparision.

Chad

#13 Guest_drewish_*

Guests

Posted 04 January 2007 - 10:59 PM

Ummm...three! That is wierd. May sound crazy but is it possible that matt has a hybrid of some sort? Also what do juvi tiger muskie, spotted muskie, northern pike, ect. look like? Maybe we should get some pics for comparision.

Chad

That would be cool but not in this thread. The water that the fish was collected from only has chain and redfin pickerel.

#14 Guest_smbass_*

Guests

Posted 05 January 2007 - 12:09 AM

I have a fish that looks (markings wise) very similar to matt's, both when it was smaller and now that it is larger... still only about 9" but growing very quickly and I have had many grass and even 1 redfin before and this thing is growing much quicker. It was caught at the convention in september and was only 2.5 -3" then. I'll try to get a more recent pic of it soon. I would add though that this one looks like the snout length measurement works even when it was smaller, 4 or 5" when picture taken.

#15 Guest_drewish_*

Guests

Posted 05 January 2007 - 12:34 AM

Doesn't Matt's fish have a pretty short snout for a chain pickerel? Or is this variable? According to Fishes of TN, the snout (eye to end of snout) should be longer and not equal to the distance from the gill cover to eye.

smbass, yours looks like a chain as a juvie.

#16 Guest_smbass_*

Guests

Posted 05 January 2007 - 01:23 AM

I have two possible explanations... 1 he fed it a lot so it's fat and proportions look a little funny, or 2 it looks like that picture was taken with the back half of the fish a little more towards the camera so if its head is pointing even just slightly away from the camera it may make the snout look shorter than it is. Who knows though, I saw the fish in person when we went out in early december and I think I was the first to alert him to it looking like a chain not a redfin because he introduced it to me as a redfin and I said hmmm.... it's a little big and the markings look wrong...

#17 Guest_Skipjack_*

Guests

Posted 05 January 2007 - 01:37 AM

I have two possible explanations... 1 he fed it a lot so it's fat and proportions look a little funny, or 2 it looks like that picture was taken with the back half of the fish a little more towards the camera so if its head is pointing even just slightly away from the camera it may make the snout look shorter than it is. Who knows though, I saw the fish in person when we went out in early december and I think I was the first to alert him to it looking like a chain not a redfin because he introduced it to me as a redfin and I said hmmm.... it's a little big and the markings look wrong...

Well it is well fed

And honestly I had not really paid any attention to the major pattern change until you brought it up, Had you not noticed it, it would have still been a redfin to me. LOL

By measurement, my fish's snout length is actually shorter than its eye to operculum end. Just by a hair.

#18 Guest_teleost_*

Guests

Posted 05 January 2007 - 02:14 AM

it's a little big and the markings look wrong...

It's a little big but not yet big enough to call it a chain for sure. The markings sure do scream chain.

We've debated this fish amongst ourselves for a while now. I'm calling this thing a redfin until it gets too big for that ID to continue to work :-D

I guess the physical snout measurement counts for two with me and the markings count as one. Not sure why but thats my story and I'm sticking to it.

#19 Guest_choupique_*

Guests

Posted 05 January 2007 - 03:17 AM

Pike are darn confusing when they are small, by pike I mean Esox. Baby northern pike look nothing like adults, with a blue gray body with narrow cream bands. They also have a dark tear drop. Comparing them to grass pickerel caught in the same water they are much thinner.

I have caught young musky, and they looked cream colored with narrow blackish bands. I cannot remember if they had the tear drop. Then I seen some at the hatchery which looked like baby northerns.

Atleast with muskies and northerns, you can check the scales on the cheek and operculum. As far as I know all three pickerel have full scaled cheeks and operculums.

All the pictures of small chains I have seen they have the longer snout, compared to the grass and redfin. Ideally the redfins have a shorter snout yet than grass pickerel, but I have little experience at all with redfins and grass pickerels, relying totally on pictures.

#20 Guest_edbihary_*

Guests

Posted 05 January 2007 - 05:55 PM

I have two possible explanations... 1 he fed it a lot so it's fat and proportions look a little funny, or 2 it looks like that picture was taken with the back half of the fish a little more towards the camera so if its head is pointing even just slightly away from the camera it may make the snout look shorter than it is. Who knows though, I saw the fish in person when we went out in early december and I think I was the first to alert him to it looking like a chain not a redfin because he introduced it to me as a redfin and I said hmmm.... it's a little big and the markings look wrong...

It could just be that there is a certain amount of proportional range amongst individuals. The first time I saw it in October, I was skeptical that it was a redfin. I had never seen a redfin in person before (at that time), but I thought they were supposed to look more like grass pickerels than does this fish. Also, its fins are not red. But Matt insisted it was a redfin, so I took his word, since he has more experience. When you saw it that day in December, Brian, and said it was not a redfin, but a chain, I felt vindicated.

Matt [-X

(Just kidding. I wanted to use that smilie!)

I still say it looks EXACTLY like the pictures of a chain pickerel from NatureServe Explorer. That's my story and I'm sticking to it. It is a chain pickerel.

I think, in the end, though, only Matt will resolve the debate by updating us several months from now as the fish grows (or doesn't grow, as the case may be).

Seeing those pictures of juvenile chain pickerels has been quite informative. Thanks, guys!