Bluegill Color Morph info please?

[Desert Bus]

I have been feeding my pond for over a decade and the bluegill/bullheads/turtles were pretty normal.

What seems to be last years hatch of Bluegill, based on size, some of them are exhibiting (sorry if I get the terminology wrong here) Piebald Cyanophoresism. Normal coloration with bright shiny blue patches.

I don't fish the pond, so it'd be a bit difficult to get a pic. I'm trying to get a friend over to fish for a bit and see if they can catch one of them.

Anyway is this a known thing? I know nothing about Bluegill color morphs. I know attractive targets are less likely to be hunted when the predators are well fed, and I may have done that via 2lb of food every day for 8 months out of the year for 12 years.

Super neat to see a weird color morph in the wild.

 

[HUKIT]

My apologies that I don’t have any answers to your question but as an avid angler I’d love to see pictures. I have a 75g with a handful of Lepomis gibbosus(pumpkinseed) that I collected here.

I’m in the northwest suburbs of Chiraq if you’re looking for volunteers depending on where you’re in Indiana.

 

[Desert Bus]

I'm south of US30, on the very west side of Valparaiso Indiana. I can't host overnight, but if you wanna come catch endless Bulegill and are a normal person? I'll let you use my bathroom and maybe walk you to some decent food. Message me if you wanna make a day trip to try and catch neat fish. You can't save them for eating, it's catch and release, and the food I give them smells like cat poop, So they probably taste like cat poop.

I can literally summon like 150 Bluegill and some Bullheads and some Snapping Turtles with a snap of my fingers.

I would love to see one of the Piebalds out of the water, I just don't own a pole.

But yes, if you're down, come catch a million bluegill in hopes we can get a pic of a piebald. There's some nice 8-10"-inchers in the depths too. Almost no one fishes it and I've put thousands of pounds of food in over the years.

I wanted to make big happy fish and make friends with snapping turtles, I was not expecting color morph Bluegills. It's super neat.

 

[jjohnwm]

I'm sorry...you have a pond full of bluegills on your property...and don't own a fishing rod?

I must be misreading this...don't understand...

 

[Desert Bus]

I feed the fish and turtles, they're not to be caught for food, due to local laws. But mostly i'm pretty severely physically disabled (hypermobile Ehlers-Danlos Syndrome). It's hard to cast when your shoulder dislocates, hard to get fish off hooks when your fingers won't fing properly, trying knots lol, etc. Plus I don't want the swarm to associate me with getting caught. Let those who are not me catch endless Bluegill.

If you enjoy the sitting back, doing nothing, meditative sort of fishing? My pond is not for you. If you enjoy catching fish and/or have small children you'd like to get excited about the hobby? You can just catch fish after fish after fish.

I basically treat it as a giant Bass/Bullhead/Bluegill/Snapping Turtle/Painted Turtle/Muskrat/Canada Geese etc. chaos enclosure. All I do is add some food.

However, I have been thinking about getting a nice long bamboo pole and some string so I can tie a hot dog on and play with the Snappers. I love the Snappers.

12? years of reduced predation via regular feeding and I have a neat color morph.

People should keep Bluegill more, they're the biggest jerks in the fish world. If someone had time and money you could harvest my pond and make Electric Blue Bluegills.

 

[Desert Bus]

They will literally strike at a bare hook, and I'd love to keep them alive so if anyone wants to come try and catch a rare one please consider barbless circle hooks. Red worms and artificial grubs work well, and I can powder up their normal food if you wanna try coating/soaking whatever in it? And just call them to me and chum the water. The see me and they gather.

If I wanted to get down on my belly on the edge of the pond I could probably easily grab a Bluegill, no pole. I don't because i don't want to get that dirty, and also so many Snappers trained to come to me. I LOVE having all my fingers which is pretty normal? Most people do.

Sorry for the autistic ranting I have been in the aquarium hobby for like 40 years of my life and it is so so so neat that the pond I feed has a rare? Bluegill color morph.

I don't know where else on the internet people would be interested about this super niche thing.

Love y'all, if you're ever in my area hit me up. As a bonus I will show you my tank!

 

[Desert Bus]

oh my we have a fishing forum, i didn't notice lol, crossposting

 

[phreeflow]

Pretty curious to see this piebald morph. Hope you get a pic one day

 

[Desert Bus]

The main issue is that it's barely noticeable on the ones from 2023, nice spots on the 2024, patches on the 2025's, and the 2026's are ??? So the best targets are the 2025's. which are around 4"? in a giant swarm.

There is one I have named "Dot" because has a bright blue dot right in front of her dorsal. She's a 24 and the first example I noticed. Some guys kid got a 23 and was all why so blue?

I just really want some verification, some pictures, etc. If anyone's got a cast net the odds go up.

 

[Desert Bus]

Pretty curious to see this piebald morph. Hope you get a pic one day

Think normal Bluegill/Electric Blue Jack Dempsey or EB Achara

I know a lot of fish nerds and I know fishermen and obviously I am inviting random people over from a couple of forums I've been on for decades who probably? won't kill me.

I'm gonna get this done. It's neat. It should be recorded in some way.