# Is this a Shoal or Small Mouth?



## HydraYak (May 21, 2017)

Caught at Morgan Falls. Can't tell if it's a shoal or a small mouth. Have had people tell me both.

Fish ID?


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## lagrangedave (May 21, 2017)

Big smallmouth. Nope Shoalie.............tough call


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## Coenen (May 21, 2017)

I'll go Shoalie. Feel like a smallie would have a deeper body. Maybe a hybrid?


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## HydraYak (May 22, 2017)

I'm stuck on this one... strangest bass I've ever hooked;

Black eyes, dark green color with shades of blue and purple. 
A bluish lower jaw and belly. 
Vertical stripes like a shoal / small mouth. 
Fat and short.


I want to say small mouth. But everyone I know that bass fishes the hooch says that there are no small mouth in that section. Only spots and shoal bass.


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## OwlRNothing (May 22, 2017)

Well, the DNR could have told you - but I'm going to assume you released it? 

Smallmouth bass in the Hooch. Nah. Couldn't be.


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## HydraYak (May 22, 2017)

I release everything in freshwater. 

Some saltwater species that i fish for wind up on the grill though!


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## The mtn man (May 22, 2017)

Not a smallmouth.


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## fish hawk (May 22, 2017)

Shoal bass


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## Buckman18 (May 22, 2017)

shoal bass


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## Randy (May 22, 2017)

Smallie, but could be a mutt, mixture, we know they are there.


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## weagle (May 24, 2017)

I've caught several of those at Morgan Falls.  A buddy of mine who's a member on GON and a professional fisherman (LanierSpots) tells me it's a smallmouth.  












The shoal bass I have caught in that same area looked different.  They had the red eyes and were more white on their belly like this one:


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## Yakman22 (May 24, 2017)

Looks like a smallie to me


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## HydraYak (May 25, 2017)

The more i hear from everyone one and research it... I'm leaning smallie. Weagle that's the same fish; first and middle pic!


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## OwlRNothing (May 25, 2017)

yeah, you can't go by the color of the eye.


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## fish hawk (May 25, 2017)

OwlRNothing said:


> yeah, you can't go by the color of the eye.



This.Shoal bass all day long but if you want to call it a small mouth thats your call.


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## Coenen (May 25, 2017)

PM ShoalBandit and see what he thinks. He's quite the repository of knowledge on this subject.


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## weagle (May 26, 2017)

fish hawk said:


> This.Shoal bass all day long but if you want to call it a small mouth thats your call.



It's not just the color of the eye, it's the short, fat, thick body, dark brown body and the really small mouth.


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## fish hawk (May 28, 2017)

weagle said:


> It's not just the color of the eye, it's the short, fat, thick body, dark brown body and the really small mouth.



Maybe it is a smallie or some type of intergrade but the video has been edited to give it  and the surroundings a golden hue,the frames at 6 seconds and again at 1:33 are more indicative of the true color also check the the split screen frame,in the mentioned frames the fish sure does have a dark green back,they call them bronze backs for a reason.I'm guessing that water is on the clear side,if thats the fact then the bronze color would be really pronounced.I'm not suggesting the editing was done on purpose to try and fool anyone,I know folks like to play around with their videos to make them more entertaining.


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## HydraYak (May 28, 2017)

Correct... I did edit some parts of the video.

The thumbnail is not true color (obviously). I've been running the thumbnail images through an app to bring out cool colors.

So it was cloudy and kind of dark outside when i caught this fish. In the raw video, you couldn't see any markings on it at all... it was just a black/green silhouette. I had to increase the exposure to brighten up the picture enough to see the detail on the fish. Which flushed out the sky and some colors. So then I tried to add some color correction.


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## fish hawk (May 29, 2017)

Gotcha.Do you have a pic of the fish in normal lighting?


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## HydraYak (May 30, 2017)

The second frame in the video is true color


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## NCHillbilly (May 30, 2017)

OwlRNothing said:


> yeah, you can't go by the color of the eye.



I have caught thousands and thousands of smallmouth over the years. They swim about a couple hundred yards from my front door. Many of them have red eyes. Many of them don't.


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## ambush80 (May 30, 2017)

I have caught some genuinely bronze colored shoal bass from the Hootch.  They taste like all the rest.


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## fish hawk (May 30, 2017)

NCHillbilly said:


> I have caught thousands and thousands of smallmouth over the years. They swim about a couple hundred yards from my front door. Many of them have red eyes. Many of them don't.



Same here except shoalies,spots,suwannees  and largemouth,I've noticed it being more pronounced during the spawn.


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## ShoalBandit (Jun 2, 2017)

Coenen said:


> PM ShoalBandit and see what he thinks. He's quite the repository of knowledge on this subject.


Thanks Coenen. Most if not all of the fish below Morgan Falls Dam that superficially resemble Smallmouth will be some kind of hybrid. That's because Smallmouth Bass were illegally introduced by anglers on top of native Shoal Bass. Since that time there has been extensive hybridization between native Shoal Bass and the introduced Smallmouth Bass. You also have nonnative Spotted Bass genetics coming up from West Point and nonnative Alabama Bass genetics coming down from Lanier. I know biologists have sampled multiple Shoal x Smallmouth hybrids and a Shoal x Alabama x Spotted Bass hybrid from this section of the Chattahoochee.

1. Smallmouth Bass have very dark pelvic fins and the color will extend to the tip of the pelvic fin.

2. Smallmouth Bass DO NOT have a prominent dark spot at the base of the tail called a basicaudal spot.
























1. Shoal Bass have white to semitranslucent pelvic fins. In a few rare cases I have seen Shoal Bass with some color on the upper third of the pelvic fin. 

2. Shoal Bass have a prominent dark spot at the base of the tail called a basicaudal spot. 






























This fish has dark pelvic fins and a basicaudal spot. Also the coloration and markings (particularly around the head) are unlike those typically seen on a Smallmouth Bass (IMO).


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## weagle (Jun 2, 2017)

ShoalBandit.  Excellent and very informative post.  Thanks for sharing.


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## HydraYak (Jun 3, 2017)

Awesome information ShoalBandit! Thank you for taking the time to put that together.

I didn't realize there was so much hybridization going on between species... AND, I've fish lanier my whole life and never once heard anyone talk about Alabama Bass lol. Guess I'll have to start studying up!


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## ShoalBandit (Jun 4, 2017)

No problem glad you guys found the info useful. 

BTW I just noticed the second Smallmouth from the top appears to have a basicaudal spot. Since it came from the Savannah River it's most likely a Bartram's x Smallmouth hybrid. Bartram’s Bass belong to a clade (species more closely related to each other than any other group) that includes Shoal Bass, the recently described Chattahoochee Bass, and the undescribed Altamaha Bass. Like Shoal Bass, Bartram's Bass have a basicaudal spot. 

Bartram's Bass native to the Savannah River drainage


























Bartram's x Smallmouth hybrid from the Savannah River near Augusta, GA.











HydraYak said:


> I didn't realize there was so much hybridization going on between species...


That's the problem with moving fish around. What these people don't understand is the relatively small number of fish they illegally introduce will most likely spawn with native species because there's more of them. Unfortunately, when black bass spawn they produce thousands of offspring. The F1 hybrid offspring produced from just one spawn vastly outnumbers the relatively small number of fish released (illegally) and the problem just snowballs from there. 
Using Lake Blue Ridge as an example if you illegally introduce 5 Alabama bass you could have more than 5,000 F1 Smallmouth x Alabama hybrids after just 1 spawn. The problem just grows exponentially from there because most, if not all of those F1 hybrids are going to produce even more hybrids by spawning with other F1 hybrids, native Smallmouth, and/or the illegally introduced Alabama Bass.



HydraYak said:


> ... AND, I've fish lanier my whole life and never once heard anyone talk about Alabama Bass lol. Guess I'll have to start studying up!


That's not all that surprising...the Alabama Bass (_Micropterus henshalli_) was considered a subspecies of Spotted Bass (known as the Alabama or Coosa Spotted Bass) until 2008 when it was formally described as a separate species. Most anglers still call both species 'Spotted Bass' but true Spotted Bass (sometimes called Kentucky or northern Spotted Bass) are native only to the Mississippi River drainage. 

Alabama Bass are native only to the Mobile Bay drainage. They were first recorded from the Chestatee River arm of Lake Lanier in 1970 so they were most likely introduced (illegally) during the mid-late 1960s. I'm a third generation Lanier angler and I've been fishing the lake since the 1970s. At various times I've heard from reputable guides, tournament anglers and local fishing show hosts that 'Spotted Bass' were native (false) and northern strain 'Spotted Bass' (also false).  

Largemouth Bass, Shoal Bass, and the recently described Chattahoochee Bass are the only black bass native to the Apalachicola-Chattahoochee-Flint River drainage.


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