Good morning folks!
I really want a trophy bluegill for my wall. Where and on what would I find such a worthy fish? I'm not too picky as far as trophy goes. Just a nice big beautiful sunfish would suffice. I have caught a lot of fish out of a tank I but never one to mount. I currently use a bobber and a jig tipped with night crawler. We do well on them during the spring summer and fall. Thanks

How big do you classify "trophy"?

there really isn't a set term for a trophy gill... I feel a trophy gill is more of a beauty is in the eye of the beholder, gills arn't quite like bass where you catch a 10# and you know you have a trophy to me is it of decent size, how are the colors are they sharp crisp, A trophy gill isn't about monsters it's more about catching a fish that just makes you go wow... this fish is beautiful that to me is a trophy gill

I saw a mounted bluegill at a Delta Dinner one time and thought it was cool and I wanted one like it. Fly I may take your suggestion and look for a fish that goes wow.

my wife concideres anything under 10" a dink. a fish 10" to 12" big. Any perchy type fish over a foot long would be a trophy. But,! That is the size requirments for her lakes. Up in North Texas perhaps the size would be smaller. Id just say anything over 12"s would be your target sized fish.

Maybe trophy is the wrong word. I want good sized bluegill to put on my wall. I don't know about you but we catcha lot of little ones to get to the nice ones.

Your best bet to get a good size Sunfish will be during the spring through Fall. The lakes around here would be Lake Austin, Lake Dunlap, Decker (Austin),Mcqueeney, or even Fayette. All of these lakes hold some very nice Trophy Sunnies.



Side Note: A trophy fish is considered by Texas Parks&Wildlife to be any Sunfish 10" or over. That will get you a Big Fish Award and a possible catch&release record for the water body. To me a trophy fish can be what ever satisfies the angler. Just my two cents.

If you really want to catch a monster bluegill that is a trophy in anybody's book, and you don't mind traveling east and paying a very reasonable guide fee for a day (no more than what some guides charge on public water in Florida), I guide on several ponds and lakes in middle Tennessee that have been intensively managed for trophy bluegill since mid-2009. A 31-oz. hybrid bluegill was caught from one of these ponds in October, and a hybrid that weighed 28 oz. was caught last May; several pure-strain northern bluegill in the 24-28 oz. range were caught from three of the ponds. If you've never caught a bluegill over a pound, I can all but guarantee you'll catch your personal best within the first two hours of fishing, and the possibility is good for a 12" two-pounder.








Here are some more photos of bluegill that have come from ponds I guide on recently:

http://bigbluegill.com/photo/photo/listForContributor?screenName=03t196d5678p4

Very nice Gills! Trophies for sure!

Thanks, Banker! Hope you can make it the next time Federico heads this way!

If you have even a small boat any the water stays clear lake Ivie has some giant copper nose in it. I was bass fishing but stumbled upon an area of beds the size of about six of my ranger boats put together. Bass left my mind grabed a spinning reel and crappie jig and wore them out for an hour. I don't know I this will help but I a shell cracker works pretty fish in there own right crater lake in the witchita mnts. By Lawton Oklahoma has some giants a well and it is tiny the size of a park pond.

The best trophy sunfish bait that I know of is small leeches. If you want to go with lures, I've seen fly guys do great with olive wooly buggers, cap spiders and dry flies in wasp and bee patterns for trophy sized bream. For conventional lures for trophy bream, it's hard to beat larger (around 2") tubes, topwaters and C-rigged hardbaits, craw replicas, spoons and soft plastic creature baits in general. Color combos with black in them are best for size but not numbers in my experience.

For where, in your neck of the woods I would look into a guided trip on Caddo, Big Sam and/or T-Bend. They are known for having huge bluegills and redears. Fork has them and has guides for them, but I hear it's not like it once was. OH Ivie is not talked a lot about having some big bream, but I have seen the evidence and I believe! But I would definitely suggest a guide there if nowhere else. All the other lakes are, find the right coves or creek arms, type of lakes. So you can do with out the guide help. OH Ivie has plenty of similar water, but clear water lakes like that will try your patience + the sheer size of that lake is no joke!

A nice Sunfish hanger would be nice for the wall! I have seen some super replicas on some web sites this past year. The replicas were from Bluegill. Redear, Redbreast, Greens, and Warmouth would all make for a nice hanger. As for Longear they have the most color however I don't see to many over 7 inches.

I think I would be more impressed by the coloring .I love sunfish during spring and fall . Last year my 11 year old nephew went out with his camera and fishing equipment just to categorize the different colors he could find in one creek . He got everything from and incredible sunset orange , bright sunrise yellow , metallic looking turquoise and deep blues . They were just works of art he printed and framed his favorite.