Salomone: Bluegills and fly rods.
Fun to fight and tasty to eat, bluegills are the favorite of anglers at any age
Michael Salomone/Courtesy photo
Bluegills, the ubiquitous catch of most anglers across the United States. Found from border to border, from puddles and ponds to great lakes and rivers, the fish thrive wherever they swim.
Their endurance, coupled with a willingness to take a top water fly and fight like a young Mike Tyson, bluegills make any real angler smile. For trout anglers looking to change up their fly-fishing game, bluegills lead the way to angling amusement.
Chunked under the umbrella term ‘panfish,’ bluegills fill a giant niche in the angling game. Panfish describes the size, shape and edibility of these small, common and tasty fish. Other fish included under the panfish term would be crappie, yellow perch and warmouth.
Like the panfish term, Bluegill is a blanket label akin to ‘Kleenex.’ The fish may be some other type of “panfish,” but get placed under the simple term of bluegill even though they may be another species.
Travel around and talk to enough anglers and you will find a plethora of nicknames for the generic term bluegill. Some names are obscure, others are a more descriptive term for the fish. Regardless of nomenclature, all of the fish grouped under the collective term panfish are just like the name implies: they are really good in the pan to eat.
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The fish spawn and reproduce easily. Self-contained populations can quickly exceed the living condition of a small body of water, so some natural attrition is necessary. It could be predatory fish like largemouth bass, which feed on juvenile bluegills, or it could be a conscientious angler looking to lower the numbers in a pond with some selective catch and take. Whatever the approach, keeping the population under control prevents stunting growth and overcrowding.
Nicknames come from all parts of the country. Down South, the names hold special associations when spoken with a slight southern drawl. Wherever the name hails from, one thing is for sure: bluegills are the unspoken favorite for a lot of anglers. A quick list of some of the names given to these fish can be quite long: Pumpkinseed, Redbreast, Sunfish, Greenie, Bluegills, Coppernose, Brim, Bream, Perch, Sunny, Roach, Stumpknocker, Longear.
The best way to chase them is on top. A rubber-legged spider is about as plain Jane as a fly angler can get, but they work. Bluegills are voracious feeders, engulfing all manner of aquatic nymphs, adult bugs on the surface and eating any food source that can fit into their mouth. Small, bite-sized dry flies are greedily gulped from the surface. This gives dry fly anglers a purist approach to a workingman’s fish. Parachute adams, small elk hair caddis and any type of terrestrial fly beg to be eaten.
Slight movement in your fly choice indicates life. Any fly with rubber legs sells it. Bluegills will stare down a bug before attack. A simple blurp pulls the fly from the surface. While the fish watch the bug, anglers watch the fish. The anticipation causes fly anglers to jump the gun and in a quick reaction they pull the fly away prematurely. Let them grab it and turn, then set the hook.
A benefit for catch-and-release anglers is that fly fishing has a way of not injuring fish like treble hooked lures and long shank worm hooks. Small fly hooks are often barbless and easily removed.
Panfish are an exercise in adolescence. Eighty-year-olds and 8-year-olds both revel in the same amusement found on the end of a floating fly line. The availability of bluegills makes them attractive. The edibility of the fish makes them highly desirable. And their aggressive nature makes them an admirable catch on gear matched to the quarry.
Lighter weight fly rods excel in panfish angling. Three-weight and 4-weight rods flex and feel the hard fighting fish. Five-weight rods are at the top of the list for panfish and a welcome advantage for when a rogue bass devours your panfish popper.
Gypsum Ponds State Wildlife Area(SWA) has two ponds that have been stocked with panfish. Bluegills and yellow perch are two of the favorites located in Gypsum Ponds SWA. Small nymphs or a squirmy wormy fished under a strike indicator will catch bluegills as well as the rainbow trout that are in the pond too.
Bluegills are the favorite of any angler who desires a fish that eats flies with careless abandon and fills the edges of a cast iron skillet with the best fish fry possible.
