November, 1954 
BENNETT: LARGEMOUTH Bass IN RinGE LAKE 
255 
Table 13—Average total lengths of largemouth bass at, or approximately at, ends of 
named growing seasons, Ridge Lake, 1941-1949. 
AVERAGE ToraL LENGTH IN INCHES at END or NAMED Grow1NcG SEASON 
Year-CLAss NuMBER 
or Broop S a 
AMPLES tee ond 
(C2) er 1,780 8.31 7.6! 
1944....... 96 = —_ i! 
WOAS Sos Ss. : 580 8.4 12.0 1 
BAG Ts. d 286 i 10.7 1 
(ee a 1,038 7.4 10.1 1 
(22) ae 203 7.6 11.0 1 
i? 290 8.8 a 
Lut] ee 4,273 — _- 
Average?.... — 8.1 10.3 2 
4th Sth 6th 7th 8th 
11.5 14.3 16.7 17.4 18.8 
15.8 —_— — — — 
Ih | tase) dee Ne |. es 
1 Average for end of first growing season based on small number of samples taken by angling. 
Average for end of 
second growing season based on fish taken in 1943 draining census. 
2 Average of average lengths at ends of named growing seasons. 
soon as the fry of the 1945 spawn ap- 
peared, the escaped fish had an abundance 
of food available to them. After June of 
1945, they made rapid growth, and in 
1946, when they were caught as unmarked 
fish, they ranged from 10.5 to 13.5 inches 
in length (the scales indicated a 7- to 11- 
inch increment for 1945). 
The ability of the 1941 brood of bass 
to curtail the survival of postfry bass 
seems to have been lost in 1944, and no 
brood produced from 1944 on was able to 
control the survival of young bass to an 
extent comparable to the control exercised 
by the 1941 brood in 1942 and 1943. 
In spite of the relatively small bass 
spawn observed in 1946, and the appar- 
ent absence of surviving bass spawn in 
1948, the 1946 brood was represented in 
scale collections by 286 fish and the 1948 
brood by 203 fish, table 13. 
Scale studies indicated that although 
the numbers of spawn surviving in years 
in which the lake was not drained were 
relatively small, they contributed in some 
degree to the numerical size of the bass 
population in later years. 
Plateaus in the growth curves in fig. 
13, corresponding to early summer periods 
following March drainings, suggest that 
the draining operations greatly reduced 
the food resources of the lake for the large 
bass replaced in it, and that, in spite of 
the fact that the poundage of bass re- 
turned after each draining census was 
smaller than that taken in the census, 
several months were required before the 
fish resumed their growth. In 1949, the 
food shortage was more severe than usual 
because the lake basin failed to refill com- 
pletely until fall. 
The average lengths attained by indi- 
Table 14.—Average total lengths of bluegills at, or approximately at, ends of named 
growing seasons, Ridge Lake, 1944-1949. 
| 
Year-Criass_ | 
or Broop 
| 
NuMBER OF 
AVERAGE Total LENGTH IN INCHES AT END or NAMED 
GROWING SEASON 
SAMPLES 
2nd 3rd 4th 5th 
— 6.9 Tiss 7.8 
6.3 6.5 ddl = 
5.6 6.9 = = 
330 8.0! = — 
7.6 = = = 
6.4 = = = 
6.2 Ye 7.6 7.8 
1 Measurements actually taken in May, 1950. beginning of fourth growing season. 
2 Average of average lengths at ends of named growing seasons. 
