I Wonder....

[unspoken930]

My mom gave me the idea the other day.... she said she used to fish for the little ones, get one and keep it untill it got pick and put it back into the lake.... i wonder if i could do that... i mean theyre cool fish and max out at 9 inches or so NORMALLY... though i caught an 11 inch one the otehr day.... anyways, just wondering

 

[Noobyfish]

I did this before. I had a crayfish, some rock bass and a blue gill all from my lake/ widened river i live on. They were all in only a 10 gallon. After a month I released them, cause when they grew the tank became to croweded and the damn crayfish kept escaping. They had grown 2-3 times bigger while i kept them. Id say you probly need like 3-5 gallons per inch for these fish, maybe not I could be wrong.

The bluegill are really good looking though wonder why noone uses em as aquarium fish, ive seen more rediculous things sold at the pet store.

edit *The ones I caught around here were very very courfull, maybe they werent bluegil at all because i cant find any pictures to match what I had.

 

[PaulEbs]

Sorry to wee on your fire but in my opinion I completely disagree with taking fish from their natural habitat and keeping them in an aquarium of that size.

Fair enough a lot of the fish in my own aquarium are only a few gens down the line of natural, but atleast they, and their parents parents have only known the four sides of glass which housed them. They don't even know of their 'supposed' life in the tropics.

If you want to house these gorgeous 'natural' fish then give them something descent to live in!

rarr...

 

[Noobyfish]

I knew it was a bad idea to keep them and I would never think of keeping them longterm ever unless I had a very large tank. The were barely minnows when I got them from a minnow trap. And I kept them in the water from the exact lake they came from with exact plants and sand.

To give you an idea of how beatiful these fish are ive found two similar looking species, one of which also occurs in my lake.


Take the body shaped and speckles of this one




And add the red belly of this one, only the belly is more bright orange.


These fish are quite small being about the size of an adult discuss.

 

[unspoken930]

hmmm i wonder how big of an aquarium youd need for a carp! lol!! i caught one that was about 30 inches long and there were some mosters out there... this thing was a halfling compared to them!...not that id want one, theyre kind of nasty.

 

[Noobyfish]

I wouldnt attempt keeping something that big.

 

[Tolak]

One concern would be any legalities. Some areas have laws against keeping wild caught fish in a home aquarium. Getting caught usually means confiscation of fish, & fines.

Another concern is exposing your new wild caught pet to diseases foreign to it's natural habitat, then transfering these diseases to that habitat if it gets put back into the wild. Best bet would be to contact your local Department of Natural Resources before considering doing something like this. Sometimes it's legal, sometimes you need a permit, and sometimes it's a no go, depending on where you live.

 

[Noobyfish]

I had never thought of this before but its a very good point about the diseases. Me myself I wouldnt worry about the legalities of it but you might I dont know, I see guys all the time keeping minnows in dyi setups keeping them for bait. I just wouldnt want to introduce a disease to my lake or any other lake. So I will probly never do this again.

 

[unspoken930]

Well if you kept the fish in a species only aquarium that has never had any other fish but it in it and you kept them relatively healthy (no obvious diseases) then i dont think youd have a major problem. And what kind of fish are blue gill anyways... they kind of look like cichlids maybe kind of.... i dont know.

 

[Tolak]

Minnows are often sold as bait, keeping minnows is no problem. Fish considered game fish often can't be sold live.

 

[Noobyfish]

Yeah if you were careful and had only fish from the same lake youd be ok. I dont know about bluegill I thought had some but i guess I dont. I read that most sunfish like 31 C water so I hope you have a good heater . Make sure you have very good filtration, do lots of water changes and keep them in a big tank.

 

[fishfishfish]

one of my moms friends has a 225 gallon freshwater tank with a blue gill,2 black crappies,2 yellow bullhead(which i caught),3 perch, a largemouth bass,and 3 rock bass.they are very healthy fish i might add.he varies their diet alot.he uses small minnows,night crawlers,crayfish,and crickets.

 

[unspoken930]

How many gallons would it take for 2 bluegill do you think?

 

[Tolak]

From what I've heard, they are aggressive, messy fish. Following the stocking guidelines for oscars, or other large n.w. cichlids would probably be a good start.

 

[sparrow6190]

blue gill taste good breaded and fried

i used to catch them all the time....
i wanna go fishing again