i need help to figure out what they look like

do a web search for it

thanks

the ones I have caught resemble a Spotted Bass, although darker with smaller mouth

I think that would be Sara Palin? LOL

http://www.wildlifedepartment.com/newsrelease/03306/recordhigh.jpg

This is the Oklahoma record and probably the World Record "Meanmouth" caught from Veteran's Lake in 2006. It weighed 8#5oz. and was verified by DNA testing done by TPWD. It was a spotted bass x smallmouth bass cross.

It replaced a previous record from Lake Texoma that was caught just a month earlier that weighed over 6 pounds. Both fish smashed the previous known record (5#8oz) from Missouri.

I have caught a few small ones at Lake Arbuckle in Oklahoma and the markings are very distinct if you are familiar at all with what spotted bass and smallmouth look like. They look different. Tiny mouth compared to body size, way more dark markings than smallmouth, more green than bronze, and that characteristic tooth patch on the tongue like the spotted bass.

While they are still a rarity, we are seeing more of these in lakes that have native spotted bass and stocked smallmouth like Texoma and Arbuckle.

GeneG
ODWC Biologist

I think that I have caught two on Texoma. They had the lateral line that looked like a spotted bass, but the mouth looked like a smallmouth. They were also a dark brown color.

Both fish were about 12 in. long and I thought that they were smallies, but when I was releasing them, I saw the lateral line.

I suspect what they look like varies greatly.. I first heard the name "meanmouth" many years ago when referring to a hatchery bred crosses between a Northern largemouth and smallmouth bass. They get their name from being very aggressive and biting swimmers in the ponds they were stocked in and being easier to catch! I believe that natural hybrids are rare but not unheard of.. Pure strain guadalupe bass are now rare because of spots and smallmouth inter breeding with them but TPWD has begun stocking pure guadalupe strain bass to help set things back to normal..

you ain't kidding about the smallmouth/guad hybrids. I caught a lot this summer on a trip to the Guadalupe below Canyon, and every bass was an obvious hybrid. They are some fugly bass too...