Everything today is based on bigger is better, and I love to bass fish as much as the next guy. Bass fishing is a sport now, it isn't as recreational. Recreational would imply it doesn't take as much work as it does to bass fish. So what made me fall in love with bass fishing? When I was a kid, my family would go to Toledo Bend back in its hay day. Heck limits were 15 then, and sometimes we would be done in a couple of hours. I miss those days. I miss the schooling action. But those were North American Largemouth. Now if I get 15 bites in a day, I'm happy. Personally, I would love to see the North American strain restocked. My question is this, is the Florida Strain so important to the survival of bass fishing and how do y'all feel about the North American strain?

I'm sure they are working on developing a bass that grows as big, as quickly as the Florida bass, with the aggressiveness, schooling characteristics, and cold temperature tolerance of the Northern strain.

Tiger bass is that strain, it is mostly sold as stock brood, not used as much by large fisheries. It is my understanding they feel the tiger strain will occur naturally when Floridas are introduced.

Just realize, the northern strain is native to our waters for the most part. The stocking of Floridas doesn't equate to a pure Florida strain in a body of water for life.

After a front, give me the Northern Strain cause them Florida Bass HATE FRONTS!!

North end of Toledo has been stocked many times by a local. He stocked northern strain. I'll leave it at that....

I would pick northern over Florida strain, they may not get as large but they can get pretty dang decent. Wasn't the long time state record from Medina lake and I think it was a bit over 15 lbs, all northern too. I don't like the traits that the Florida strain brings.

There seems to be different taste between the two,I don't which one is better.

there's a SAL forum?

No sir. It was 13.5 from Medina and that fish was found to have Florida genes. It is speculated that someone had been bringing fish from Florida and putting them into Medina prior to that.

Well, dependin' upon whether you's a dedicated lumper or a lousy splitter, you gotta figure out first whether you're dealing with a "strain" or a "subspecies." Or a strain within a subspecies. At any rate when you stock "Southern" strain into "Northern" strain populations, the long term "What kind of bass is these here ones?" depends a lot on both weather and climate, amongst other things. The splitter done won out in the long run....Micropeterus salmoides salmoides vs. Micropterus salmoides floridanus is the generally accepted terminology for most biologists.

Here in Texas we done learnt about a thing called "genetic drift" which drives the entire population (within a semi-closed unit like a reservoir, lake or pond) in one direction or tuther. Basically the further North and more extreme (hot and cold) the weather and climate, the more that drift moves towards Northern strain, sometimes retaining some Southern genes, sometimes not much. In those cases, periodic restocking with pure strain "Florida" (Southern) helps maintain a higher percetnage of Southern genes in the overall population.

Down here on the coast where I live its exactly the opposite, the genetic drift takes the entire population right to the pure Southern strain in not a lot of generations.

For me and the folks I serve with my hatchery and fishin' club I figured long ago I needed to breed my own "strain" of "intergrade" (or "hybrid") fish using a broad group of fish from many places initially and selecting expressly for....not ultimate size, but for "catchability."

So, I find that certain characteristics within the Northern strains to be highly desirable and have incorporated those into my long term breeding project to produce a bass that both grows to large sizes and is easily caught by hook and line.

Them smart fellers over in Alabammy calls theirs "Tiger" bass or maybe its the "Gorilla" ones. But a similar idea in play. I seen their product, both as a fingerling and in fisheries and I must say its A-1.

There's a whole lot more'n just "breedin" involved, but last week one of my members down here caught hisself 86 bass up to 8 an' a haff one day. 'Course I see that in the log book and just throw my pole down an' give up. I can't do that even at my own place. All I'm gettin' is an inferiority complex.

Knew I should have googled it before I posted. Dang, who in the world could have been transporting fish across half the country to dump them into a tiny lake like Medina, almost seems like it would be a very hard feat to keep a fish alive that long in those days.

Was Perry's world record also Florida strain? Surely it was to be that big. I guess it shows they people wanted big bass even before fishing was so popular.