That’s a Whole Lotta’ Lunkers!

See those water-filled cylinders in the pic? Now you see all that yellow stuff in the bottom that looks like something out of Ghostbusters – ectoplasm, maybe?

Those are thousands of eggs spanwed by Texas largemouths, but we’re not talking about just any ol’ bass. Those are the eggs of ShareLunker bass, the prized thoroughbreds of the fish world.

Looks to me like some big bucketmouths have been awfully busy in Texas.

For those not familiar with the ShareLunker Program, it basically works like this…

1. You catch a giant bass (the fish has to be over 13 pounds to qualify).
2. You call a 24-hour hotline to tell the Texas Parks & Wildlife Dept. (TPWD) that you just landed the toad of all toads.
3. TPWD arrives on the scene and and takes your big momma back to the hatchery where they try to get her to spawn.
4. TPWD waits for the eggs to hatch and then reintroduces the fingerlings containing the trophy DNA back into Texas fisheries and the process starts all over again. It’s the circle of life, man!

And boy, do they get these fish to spawn! Check out some of these quotes from the Texas Parks and Wildlife ShareLunker Program Facebook page about the number of eggs produced this year:

> The Toyota ShareLunkers wrapped up their spawning season in a big way today. On Tuesday, ShareLunker 514 produced 20,696 eggs. The next day Toyota ShareLunker 509 produced 50,156 eggs. And ShareLunker 521, which had a spawn of 61,120 eggs earlier, produced a second huge spawn of 48,447 eggs. I’m sure they would appreciate a round of applause! Now they and the others can go home and get ready for next year.

> Toyota ShareLunker 507 dominoed again–32,219 eggs this time. That means two fish have produced more than 115,000 eggs–awesome!

> (this comment accompanies the photo above) It’s pretty unusual to have three ShareLunker spawns hatching at once. We also have teensy-tiny baby bass in itty-bitty raceways. Adam Hammons, one of the Lunker Bunker crew, took this photo. These guys are like a bunch of nervous fathers-to-be waiting for the eggs to hatch.

> We have a 90% hatch rate on our sharelunker spawns and 95% of them make it to an inch. We have had 6 spawns this year. We just stocked a 1 acre with 70,000 fry from the Lake Gilmer lunker spawn…(100% return). We have the technology to do this very consistently.—-TFFC technician

Pretty stinkin’ cool, huh?

Here’s a look at how the whole spawning and egg-harvesting process works. Look how big that female looks compared to the male. Crazy! Makes you want to drop a worm in there, doesn’t it?

And here’s a vid shot yesterday of some freshly hatched future trophies. With a little over a week left in the 2011 ShareLunker season, this year’s specimens have produced 255,503 fry. “A very good year,” according to the video.

After momma bass is done doing the deed, she gets taken back to the lake where she came from so she can be caught again. In fact, one of this year’s ShareLunkers, #523 caught out of O.H. Ivie Reservoir, was actually caught last year and registered as ShareLunker #503. What’s interesting is that when she was caught in 2010 she weighed 16.08 pounds and was certified as a lake record. This year that same fish checked in at 14.94 pounds. And 503/523 isn’t the only fish to be caught and entered more than once. One lunker has actually taken the trip to the Texas Freshwater Fisheries Center (TFFC) on three separate occasions.

ShareLunker 503/523 spawned at the hatchery in 2010, but didn’t get it done this year. The biologists at the hatchery decided it was in her best interest to go ahead and get her back home. They explain why in this video:

After seeing that, who’s up for a trip to Ivie? Texas definitely has it going on when it comes to growing trophy largemouths. Now if I could just figure out how to catch one of these suckers. You think I could pay one of those biologists to put a homing beacon in one of these big gals before they let her go?