Bream

[JAYBIRD1011]

I don't have a tank for it, but I have always been curious. I live in SE NC.
Bream and bass are plentiful. I know that bass get much too large for me to keep. But the bream. How large minimum tank size to keep one or two. I imagine that you would have to start with fry. This is just a mental exercise for me so please take it that way. I don't plan to jump into anything I'm not prepared for.

 

[duanes]

Bream normally reach 10" to 12".
As adults a tank of at least 125 to 150 gallons would work.
For juvies to grow to half that size, maybe a 55 or 75 gal.

 

[JAYBIRD1011]

Bream normally reach 10" to 12".
As adults a tank of at least 125 to 150 gallons would work.
For juvies to grow to half that size, maybe a 55 or 75 gal.

Thanks. I didn't realize they reached quite that size. I've caught plenty of them fishing and didn't remember them so big.
I appreciate the response.

 

[0wen_96]

Do you mean bream as bluegills or like common bream and bronze bream?

 

[The Masked Shadow]

If you kept them in a 75, they wouldn't grow to that size, but there organs would keep growing, correct?

In the future, I want to make a tidal pool replica outside complete with actual tide rocks, and native fish, like the weird goby looking things I find in the tides, and potentially an octopus. Haven't thought of it in a while, but you reminded me of it.

But to be sure, you are talking about the marine one.

 

[JAYBIRD1011]

Do you mean bream as bluegills or like common bream and bronze bream?

I am talking about freshwater Bream in south eastern NC. Not sure what the correct name is. I have caught them everywhere from small streams to lakes to rivers. I never caught any more than maybe a half pound. Maybe 7 inches max. Most less than 5 inches. I just didn't really consider keeping one in a box until recently. I'll probably never do it, but it is fun to think about.

 

[JAYBIRD1011]

I took another look, and it looks like they are red breasted sunfish. The larger ones are blue gills or shell crackers. Both AKA BREAM.

 

[Cich Mind]

I took another look, and it looks like they are red breasted sunfish. The larger ones are blue gills or shell crackers. Both AKA BREAM.

I used to fish for both of those species when I was a kid. We used night crawlers for bait. The Bluegills were larger than the Sunfish. The SF don't get that big, trust me I've caught/seen many. The SF usually had some insane coloring to them, blue, yellow, orange and turquoise. Beautiful fish for an aquarium. Wink, wink. Lol

 

[The Masked Shadow]

I considered sunfish for my patio poind - the ones that get 5 inches. As for bluegill, bama bass on youtube has some. I think, when we eventually set a large pond with a stream up in our backyard, one pond will be native, and have bluegill, and/or sunfish, maybe a bass, and a bullhead catfsih.

 

[Magnus_Bane]

I took another look, and it looks like they are red breasted sunfish. The larger ones are blue gills or shell crackers. Both AKA BREAM.

Bream is just a common name used for many panfish species. As for the reason ya don't see em max sized in the wild is just due to them being predated upon by larger panfish species, most commonly the large mouth bass, and other fish species such as catfish. Use could almost consider them a middle man of sorts since they eat smaller fish and bigger fish eat them.

I've seen some pretty big bluegill come out of small ponds and such where there is a huge overabundance of bluegill compaired to all the other species. Caught a few that were pushing 9in. If ya do decide to do a native tank I would recommend finding some Lepomis Humilis a.k.a. the orange spotted sunfish. These beautiful lil guys will only reach a max of 5in, which is far smaller then most sunfish. They are perfect for a 55g imo. Here's a pic of a male, the females are kinda grey in comparison.