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Storm Lake Fish
A) White Bass (Morone chrysops)
Also known as stripe, silver bass, striper, sand bass, barfish.
Distributed across the United States, the White Bass prefers streams and lakes. They are a silver white to pale green with narrow dark stripes running lengthwise down its sides. They grow 10-12 inches long usually though the biggest can be more than 17 inches. White Bass are carnivorous, feeding on calaniod copepods, cyclopoid copepods, daphnia, and leptodora. They are visual feeders and when not frightened, will readily bit at live bait. The larger bass will sometimes eat other fish as well. These fish can be caught with light tackle, while fly fishing, or casting.
B) Black Crappie (pomoxis nigromaculatus)
Black Crappie are most easily identified byt the 7 or 8 spines on its dorsal fin. They are usually silver-grey to green in color and have black splotches all over their body. Their mouths are very wide, used for feeding on plankton, crustaceans, small fish, and insects. They usually grow 4-8 inches long, though the longest ever reported was 19.3 inches. They are usually found in lakes, reservoirs, borrow pits, navigation pools in large rivers, anywhere with little to no current, clear water, and abundant cover. They are easy to catch during their feeding times and a very popular sport fish.
C) Channel Catfish (Ictalurus punctatus)
Channel catfish are native to North America, and are found in small and large rivers, reservoirs, natural lakes, and ponds. They have a very keen sense of smell and taste, allowing them to find food in dark, stained, or muddy water. They can grow to 40-50 pounds, though the average is caught in most waterways is only between 2-4 pounds. Catfish are omnivores, eating crickets, nightcrawlers, minnows, shad, crawfish, frogs, bullheads, sunfish, and aquatic vegetation.
D) Yellow Perch (Perca flavenscens)
Also known as American perch, coontail, lake perch, raccoon perch, ring-tail perch, ringed perch, and striped perch.
Yellow Perch have yellow to brass colored bodies with 5-9 olive-green, triangular vertical bars on each side. It is found only in North America, in large and small lakes, slow-moving rivers and streams, brackish waters and ponds. The prefer places that have lots of aquatic vegetation with muck, gravel, or sand bottoms. These fish grow to be 4-10 inches long and live an average of 9-10 years. They feed on zooplankton, macroinvertabrets, invertebrates, fish eggs, crayfish, mysid shrimp, and juvenile fish at different points in their lives. They are active during the day and inactive at night unless spawning. They are a schooling fish, found mostly in larger groups during the day.
E) Walleye (Sander vitreus)
Also known as yellow walleye, colored pike, yellow pike, or pickerel
This fish is a native of Northern North America. It is known as the walleye because the fish’s eye points outward as if it is looking at the walls. Walleye see well in the dark and feed at night or in turbid waters. They are also known to be found in deep water as well. They feed on invertebrates when they are young and other fish, crayfish, minnows, and leeches once they have reached a certain size. Walleye are olive and gold colored with a large mouth and many teeth. They can grow to 31 inches in length and weigh up to 20 pounds.
F) Largemouth Bass (Micropterus salmoides)
Also known as widemouth bass, bigmouth bass, black bass, bucketmouth, largies, Potter's fish, Florida bass, Florida largemouth, green bass, bucketmouth bass, Green trout, gilsdorf bass, Oswego bass, LMB, and southern largemouth and northern largemouth
The largemouth bass is an olive-green to greenish gray fish, marked by a series of dark, sometimes black, blotches forming a jagged horizontal stripe along each flank. The upper jaw (maxilla) of a largemouth bass extends beyond the rear margin of the orbit. The largemouth is the largest of the black basses, reaching a maximum recorded overall length of 29.5 in (75 cm) and a maximum unofficial weight of 25 pounds 1 ounce (11.4 kg). Sexual dimorphism is found, with the female larger than the male. Average lifespan in the wild is 10 to 16 years.