Okay, all you ardent pondmeisters out there. Here's the scenario. I received a call from an anxious client last weekend. Seems he caught a skinny bass. His fear is that his 35 acre central Texas lake has issues. He has caught a good number of healthy bass over the last year. Here are some factoids for you.
The lake took three years to completely fill. He stocked it properly, fertilized in years 3, 4, and 5. He adds forage fish from time to time. He has two feeders, that go off twice a day. Coppernose bluegill are nearly 1.25 pounds, with several size classes. Good peripheral vegetation, mostly bushy pondweed. Bass have been stocked only 5 years. The lake is 6 years old.
Take a look at this fish, and see if you can figure out what's wrong with it. Dan Hoy, the man in charge of all BassPro Shop's aquaria, was at Lusk Lodge, Two today and helped dissect the fish to analyze with me.
I want to hear what you think.....
Post on.....



Skinny, sickly fish...oh dear, what's wrong?

Here's a couple more thoughts. This fish is 21 inches long, weighs less than 3 pounds. I know you are looking, go ahead and post your thoughts. After three or four people step out on that limb, I'll show you the next photos. It's fascinating.

he used to be happy and fat until he got a CNBG stuck in his throat?

Good thought...and I have seen that. But, a CNBG stuck would cause the fish to suffocate pretty quick. This fish has deteriorated for more than a year.

Well, he hasn't always been deformed. To paraphrase Dave Willis, if he's 21 inches he must've been 5 pounds at some point.

I'm going to guess that he has some kind of mouth injury that prevents him from swallowing good sized prey.

I think something is stuck in its stomach. It ate something then could not pass the object which reduced the amount of space for food.

That sure makes good sense. No mouth injury. And, you are right...this fish HAD to weigh at least 5 pounds, maybe more than 6 at some point of its life. Here's the next photo. That's Dan Hoy on the right, yours truly on the left.


Study it closely, see what you can see. More photos after people share more thoughts.

He was full of undigestible "Gulp" product?

parasites?

I honestly have no idea, but you have my attention.


Are you sure Princess Debbie wants you cutting up fish on the nice, new granite countertop?

It swallowed something indigestible and can't pass it.

Actually, the princess Debbie was fascinated, too. She knew I would clean up the mess, or she would kill me.
You guys are fast...you already figured it out. Look at these photos.


As I cut the stomach, look inside. The fish's organs were in pretty good shape. Its liver had some parasites, but not enough to alarm me. The heart was good, gills were normal. Kidneys were a bit distended, but I think because of the health, not the cause. The air bladder was too large, I think to help with equilibrium of a fish obviously starving.


Here's what came out of the fish's stomach. Notice in the lower left, that's a twig with what looks like a small bryozoan. This bass ate a twig with jelly on it!


The landowner had already taken out one plastic bait, from the gullet of the fish while in the live well.
My deduction? This single fish had a fetish for soft plastics. No hooks were found inside this fish. I think it ate discarded worms, couldn't digest them, clogged its system, and deteriorated. Talking about constipated!

I think Chris Steelman gets the award.

WOW!!!

I know what color soft plastics work best on that lake...

Yeah, I won. What do I get. I knew not studying would pay off.

Congratulations, Chris! I'm with you on the not studying thing.

There's a moral in there somewhere. Dont discard baits, either fake or live.

Yep, actually, those baits started off black or purple. What you see is the color of semi-digested baits...they always seem to turn that color. I have seen many baits taken from bass stomachs, and they are that color. Good work, guys...especially Chris for getting it so quickly. Have a good evening, all.

Young man (Chris Steelman), I'm trying to help kindle your entrepreneurial spirit amongst many of your future potential clientele on another thread.

Please refrain from admitting that you don't study. It could adversely affect the fledgeling Steelman-Slymer Fish Squeezing & Supply Company.

davatsa, I suspect you'll get into land rights law, so the same thought may apply to you too!

Congrats, Chris. You win the undigested plastic removed from the bass!











If you send Bob a check for the shipping.

That's a new one for me, Bob. Thanks for posting the story.

Bob Lusk worte:


Are small bryozoan colonies a viable food source for some fish? If not, what kind of role do they play in the food chain?

The reason I ask is that we have lots of little clear jelly like things attached to the aquatic vegetation in our pond. Most of these are half the size of a pea with several dozen tiny white spots evenly spaced throughout the clear jelly. I would post a picture but don't think these things would photograph very well.

I figured it was some kind of obstruction of the intestinal tract.

This is not an unsual problem. I've caught trout with plastic baits in their stomach they couldn't pass. (public waters) Here's a few pics from a fishing website of just that. It's a good thing the angler caught this fish. It would have starved to death. And btw I've caught more than one trout with a cigarette butt in it's stomach. Considering most of the nicotine is in the butt, is there a possibility the person that eats the trout could be ingesting nicotine? I've heard of children dying from eating cigarette butts from an ashtray for that reason.



fish that was caught



What was found in it's stomach

Bob thank you for posting this on the website. It makes me wonder if I should outlaw plastic baits on my pond or at the very least be very careful about discarding them. Does anyone know if a bass can digest some the plastics that claim to be biodegradable?

In 48 years I have seen one and only one person who knew/cared/was anal retentive enough (pick whichever you feel applies) to field strip cigarette butts before discarding them outdoors.

Geez Theo, I field strip my cigarettes all the time and put the butts in my pocket and dispose of them properly at the next available trash can. It's not because I am "anal retentive", it's because my dad hates seeing cigarette butts littering the pond. Littering happens to be one of his criteria for not letting peple come back and fish again. I have been doing this for so long that I field strip butts eveywhere now, public lakes included.

Did you know that on average it take 7 years for a cigarette butt to biodegrade? At least that's what I have been told.