PRETTIEST SUNFISH

      There are several kinds of sunfish native to North America, but pumpkinseed sunfish and long-eared sunfish are the prettiest, to attract the finny girls for spawning.  And they are handsome and interesting to us during summer. 

     Being closely related, the striking males of these species look much alike with wavy, light-blue lines on their gills, a black flap protruding from the end of each gill, blue freckles on their flanks and orange bellies.  But pumpkinseeds have a red spot at the rear of each gill, which long-ears don't.  And the slightly larger long-ears' longer black extension of each gill is partly surrounded by a thin, white, curved line.

     Look-alike females of both kinds are less colorful than their mates.  And each female has faint, wavy, light-blue lines on their gills, and highly visible, vertical, dark bars on their flanks that camouflage them, which is important because females lay the eggs, and nature does not need all the males.   

     During the latter half of May, both kinds of beautiful sunfish spawn in the same fashion.  Often in colonies of a few to a dozen or more, males use their tails to sweep away sediment from the bottoms of pond edge shallows, down to the gravel.  Then each one guards his foot-wide nursery from other male sunfish and watches for females ready to spawn.  The plainer, smaller female pumpkinseeds and long-ears soon join males of their kinds on the males' cradles to spawn.  Round and round each pair hovers tightly together over the nest as she lays eggs and he spreads sperm on them.  Then each female quickly leaves that egg-catching nest and is soon replaced by another female.  

     Each male can easily entertain more than one female.  And each female may go to more than one male's nest to lay her up to 1,500 eggs, which sink and adhere to the stones in each nursery.  

     Each male of both species guards the eggs, then the young, in his pond bottom nursery.  But schools of young soon leave their birth cradle and are on their own in the shallows of ponds where large fish can't reach them.  At first, the baby sunfish consume invertebrates, but as they grow, they eat small crayfish, fish and larger invertebrates.

     Both these kinds of attractive sunfish live and spawn in the shallows of ponds where they are easily seen, if the water is clear.  Individuals of both kinds can grow up to nine inches long in maturity.  But several predatory creatures prey heavily on them, thinning the numbers that mature.  Bald eagles, ospreys, herons, otter, mink, snapping turtles and large-mouthed bass are some of the wildlife that ingest many sunfish of all types.  

     Pumpkinseed sunfish and long-eared sunfish are the beauties of their family.  And they are intriguing to see in shallow ponds in the northeastern United States.  Watch for them this summer, mostly in human-made ponds.      

                   

     

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