Hey guys. Just wondering a few things about bluegill spawning. 1. When is the actual spawning period for bluegill to actually start spawning? 2. What are the distinguishing features that differentiate female and male bluegill? and 3. What are the normal spawning habits/behaviors of bluegill during the spawning season to know if their actually going to spawn or not?
Bluegill spawning questions
- Thread starter ayeyomama
- Start date
Hello; Around my area of southeast KY and northeast TN, they tend to spawn after the bass. If memory serves this is around May to early June. I do not know how the very early warm spell this year will affect them, it has already caused the local dogwood trees to bloom several weeks ahead of the annual Dogwood Arts Festival in Knoxville TN.
The males become very colorful during the spawn.
I have seen the nests in shallow parts of lakes and ponds. The nests are roughly basket ball sized depressions cleaned out by the fish. There can be many nests in an area each seperated by a few feet with a nesting pair guarding and caring for each nest. Looks like a bunch of regular spaced potholes. You can often see the adults hovering suspended in the nest and chasing away any thing that comes too close. I hope that I have recalled this corectly.
The males become very colorful during the spawn.
I have seen the nests in shallow parts of lakes and ponds. The nests are roughly basket ball sized depressions cleaned out by the fish. There can be many nests in an area each seperated by a few feet with a nesting pair guarding and caring for each nest. Looks like a bunch of regular spaced potholes. You can often see the adults hovering suspended in the nest and chasing away any thing that comes too close. I hope that I have recalled this corectly.
The clearing out the bottom makes sense. I have 3 bluegill (2 that are about 6 inches and 1 that is around 4 inches) and the two bigger ones have been holding themselves up vertically and making dramatic sweeps with their tails to clear out the gravel in have on the bottom of my tank. Both the big ones do it but I don't know if their both the same sex or capable of actually spawning. One has a lighter body that's yellowish orange with a yellow breast and a pronounced darker forehead. The other is darker overall on the whole body with a copper orange breast.
Bluegills spawn in water temps of 67 to 80 degrees. So depending on your location this could be different times of the year. The male fans out a nest in shallow water. The female deposits around 50,000 eggs and the male guards the eggs. Breeding males have bright blue and orange markings while females and immature fish have very dull colors and often have dark vertical markings. Spawning males tend to be more aggressive than non spawning males. Male bluegills make a grunting noise and repeatedly circle the nest with fins erect. After a female enters the nest the male and female swim around the nest in a circle and eventually come to rest with the male upright and the female at an angle with their bellies touching. A few eggs and some milt are released and the behavior starts over. The female doesn't always deposit all her eggs in one nest. One nest is not always used by one female. The sexual differences is the male genital opening is usually a small funnel shaped pore and the female opening looks like a small, swollen, doughnut like ring.
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