Well I did some preliminary searching online for spots having both of my desired fish. I have the Inland Fishes of Massachusetts book and although its a good book there mapping to me isn't. i wish they had listed towns and such in their location dots. never the less i opened a map and tried to pin point their locations. I headed north up to ayer, Littleton, Shirley, and Devens with my wife and son. I ended up at mirror lake in Devens and i caught my banded killi-fish.

There were huge schools of killis. the biggest that i have seen. i only took 3 home. they were all little guys. after there i stopped by a little pond down the road near a golf course. I've since looked and this pond is unnamed. this pond had HUGE snails. Golf ball size snails. I took one home.

In this unnamed pond I caught about a 6" bullhead and some crayfish. There were schools of minnows that i was unable to catch...i assume golden shiners.

next we drove around to a bunch of ponds, (sandy pond, long pond, and a few others). we stopped at phoenix pond in Shirley where a river flowed into it. took a nice rock that had a plant growing off of it. again no banded sunfish....there were lots of minnows i was unable to ID nor catch. my wife at this time refuses to go in the water with me!!
So at this point I have 1 of 2 species found...not bad but i was set out for banded sunfish. (Last month i opened my mass fish book and decided banded sunfish were the fish that i would be destined to obtain this summer) So at this point its been 4 hours....my wife is mad and makes me drive her an hour home.....


When I arrive home I'm very unhappy. I had a feeling I was hitting up good spots and i didnt wanna give up. i came online and researched for a quick 5 min....found a document online about a railroad company having to sample the area of taunton to see life that would be effected.....(who would of known a railroad company would have better records then anyone else) So i went on google maps...found the rivers, lakes, and ponds that said banded sunfish were found...then found access points and headed out to walpole, taunton, lakeville areas. I decided to go further south and work my way back up I-495. An hour later the first place i went to was Winnecunnet Pond in Norton Mass. When i saw this pond i was like jackpot. Very accessible and the weeds were everywhere!!!!! So i started scooping. nothing....nothing...nothing....finally i see some wiggles....bluegill... then a swamp darter....then a pickerel. pressed for daylight....i needed to move on....

The next spot was a 4 min drive towards Lake Sabbatia. I went where it meets the snake river...BAM second dip-net at i saw something....right off the bat i could tell it was a banded sunfish....prior i had myself thinking " i wonder how different in person are they compared to other sunfish, and would i be able to ID them myself" sure enough it was plain as day what i had caught. I started catching 1 per dip-net. I also caught a turtle and numerous tadpoles. Bandeds are beautiful. I under-appreciated these fish. I also destroyed my blackberry phone at this site...good thing I'm getting a free replacement!

now i need a new fish to try and find....suggestions?

great...but long day....here are some more pics...i was by myself so i couldnt grab lots of pics on site. i was covered in mud.








sorry about the turtle pic...i couldnt see the screen



^is that a dragon fly larva on his belly lol

Edited by bumpylemon, 25 April 2010 - 09:14 AM.

here are more pics

You found type locales for both species, sandy beach for banded killifish and shallow, mucky, swampy pond for banded sunfish. Keep the sunfish in a heavily planted tank and they'll probably be happy.

yeah I'm gonna setup a nice tank for them. I'm waiting for my 20 gallon long to be unoccupied of the 12 rainbow shiner fry i am growing out. When they get a little bigger then can go in the big tank. its gonna rain today so im unable to go collected a muddy bottom and some more plants for them. for 4 bandeds what size tank is the smallest they can have? i have a plastic 5 gallon tank i can setup temporarily for them. but i feel a 30 gallon filter is way to much. so what to i do about filtering a 5 gallon tank?

A 5 may be big enough, but only run something like an air stone or sponge filter for minimal current.

Great pictures and cute little guys. Banded sunfish are on my list of "must keep" natives. I currently only have a 33 xl set up as a native tank due to my pleco breeding, but in time, my fish room we be half native half pleco.

Did you get any images of the banded killifish?

i will try and get pics of them today when i re-home them to the 5 gallon. i do have pics of other ones in my cape cod trip report.
here are those pics

truely amazing! I never realized how pretty natives were until a few years ago when I caught a male long ear in full breeding colors.. That started my itch for natives.... Now I just have to phaze out my SA's (except the plecos of course lol..)

truely amazing! I never realized how pretty natives were until a few years ago when I caught a male long ear in full breeding colors.. That started my itch for natives.... Now I just have to phaze out my SA's (except the plecos of course lol..)

your story is very similar to mine. i randomly netted some weeds...say a swamp darter that i thought was a snakehead!!(i never knew about darters) then BOOM I was hooked.

My tank process

When I arrive home I'm very unhappy. I had a feeling I was hitting up good spots and i didnt wanna give up. i came online and researched for a quick 5 min....found a document online about a railroad company having to sample the area of taunton to see life that would be effected.....(who would of known a railroad company would have better records then anyone else) So i went on google maps...found the rivers, lakes, and ponds that said banded sunfish were found...then found access points and headed out to walpole, taunton, lakeville areas. I decided to go further south and work my way back up I-495. An hour later the first place i went to was Winnecunnet Pond in Norton Mass. When i saw this pond i was like jackpot. Very accessible and the weeds were everywhere!!!!! So i started scooping. nothing....nothing...nothing....finally i see some wiggles....bluegill... then a swamp darter....then a pickerel. pressed for daylight....i needed to move on....

The next spot was a 4 min drive towards Lake Sabbatia. I went where it meets the snake river...BAM second dip-net at i saw something....right off the bat i could tell it was a banded sunfish....prior i had myself thinking " i wonder how different in person are they compared to other sunfish, and would i be able to ID them myself" sure enough it was plain as day what i had caught. I started catching 1 per dip-net. I also caught a turtle and numerous tadpoles. Bandeds are beautiful. I under-appreciated these fish. I also destroyed my blackberry phone at this site...good thing I'm getting a free replacement!

now i need a new fish to try and find....suggestions?

The best info being from railway lands is no surprise, new England has lousy fish info that rarely updates. That is why I want a fish map here.

As for a next fish to find how about a Creek Chubsucker, it's one on my list.

Wow you were right in my home waters!
Where you aware Mirror lake has frequently been portrayed here by me? I'm pretty sure I never named it here, I usually don't. I know you didn't get it from the angling forums [where I also frequently post unnamed Mirror Lake pics].
Now that you tasted of it's sacred waters, you must never name it again on an internet forum. No, really, I mean it. You seem like a nice guy, I'd hate to hafta
If'd known you were coming I coulda set you up with the banded sunnies so you coulda scored a double.

now i need a new fish to try and find....suggestions?

Tadpole madtom in french river [that's in Fishes of Ma] and central mudminnows in the Sturbridge area.
The madtoms are well documented and supposedly in catchable numbers [never tried myself].
The mudminnows are not documented with a specimen outside the CT river drainage [last I knew] but I recieved two live ones from an icefisherman [who lurks here occasionally] who claimed to have taken them from a shallow cove of a large lake in the area.
You ketchum mudminnow, maybe get your name on a jar.

The bug on the painted turtle is a damselfly, and the snail is a Chinese mystery snail (Bellamya chinensis or B. japonica). Bellamya snails are odd in that they filter-feed in addition to scavenging and scraping algae like most snails.

Wow you were right in my home waters!
Where you aware Mirror lake has frequently been portrayed here by me? I'm pretty sure I never named it here, I usually don't. I know you didn't get it from the angling forums [where I also frequently post unnamed Mirror Lake pics].
Now that you tasted of it's sacred waters, you must never name it again on an internet forum. No, really, I mean it. You seem like a nice guy, I'd hate to hafta
If'd known you were coming I coulda set you up with the banded sunnies so you coulda scored a double.

i shall never mention it again. if i could edit my post i would!! what else is in that pond besides killis? have you tried the little pond/swamp near the golf course? thats where i got those huge snails. maybe we can plan something!

i would love to catch a mudminnow. im only 15 min from sturbridge. i dont really have interest in the madtoms. but i live 5 min from the french river. i suppose i could go catch and release those with someone some time.

alrighty i got 6 spots confirmed for the central mud-minnows. i may go out tomorrow and try the 6 spots

i shall never mention it again. if i could edit my post i would!! what else is in that pond besides killis? have you tried the little pond/swamp near the golf course? thats where i got those huge snails. maybe we can plan something!

No worries, I was just goofin on yah, well, partly anyway.http://forum.nanfa.org/public/style_emoticons/default/wink.gif

Never tried the other pond but it is on a drainage that has banded sunnies and is the right habitat.

Those big apple snails are funny. They where super abundant for years in the upper pond until some asian families discovered them. They filled buckets with them. The men would fish for trout while ladies and kids waded the shallows and picked up snails. Seems to have knocked 'em off or at least greatly reduced them.
I just wish they'd leave the monsta bluegills alone.





Trout and bass are also present but the bluegills and yellow perch are the real draw. Tons of copepods grow big panfish.

awesome pics! those are huge sunnies. i have a spot in northbridge and millbury that has huge ones...but yours may beat the ones ive caught. what shiners do you think i saw in that unamed pond? just goldens?