Largest of the true sunfishes, the redear is a favorite of Arkansas bream anglers. These spunky panfish are found statewide, and during spring and summer, Natural State fishermen swarm to blue-ribbon redear waters to get in on the year’s best action.
Redears look a lot like their bluegill cousins. Many anglers make no distinction between the two. They’re both “bream,” and they’re both good to eat and fun to catch. There are, however, important differences, both in how the fish look and how they behave.
Redears aren’t as colorful as bluegills, but they’re handsome fish nevertheless. The back is usually olive-green, fading to silvery-green sides checkered with brown or green mottling. A yellow wash colors the belly on most adult fish. The mouth is very small, and the pectoral fins are long and pointed.
The name “redear” is a practical designation based on the color of the “ear” flaps at the rear edge of the gill covers. Bluegills have dark bluish or black ear flaps, as do redears. But on adult redears, the margin of the ear flaps is usually orange or red. Males are more brightly colored than females and sport a bright-cherry-red border. Females and young usually have a pale-orange border. No other Arkansas sunfish are so marked.
Another redear characteristic is the set of hard, toothlike grinders or “shellcrackers” (hence the nickname) in the throat. These allow redears to crunch the shells of snails, tiny clams and other aquatic invertebrates that form most of the redears’ diet. They spit out the shells and chug-a-lug the rest like a Cajun at a crawfish boil.
Feeding habits of redears and bluegills also differ, a fact that may account for the absence of redears on many bream anglers’ stringers. Bluegills feed anywhere from the water’s surface to the lake bottom, but redears, like catfish, feed almost exclusively on the bottom, a habit requiring special fishing tactics.
Size is the redear’s most unique attraction. Two pounds is exceptionally large for most sunfish, but some lakes produce 1- to 2-pound redears with astounding regularity. Redears topping 3 pounds have been reported in California, Georgia, Kentucky, Ohio, Tennessee and Texas. Anglers in Florida, Alabama, Virginia and North Carolina have caught redears over 4 pounds. The all-tackle world record from Lake Havasu, Arizona, caught in February last year, weighed an astonishing 5 pounds, 12 ounces.
In Arkansas, redears average 8 to 10 inches long and about a half pound in weight. The state record caught by Glenda Tatom in Lake Bois d’Arc in May 1985 weighed 2 pounds, 14 ounces.
Redears prefer warm, clear waters with no noticeable current. They congregate around logs, standing timber, stumps, roots and green aquatic vegetation. They prefer deeper water than most other sunfish, sometimes moving to depths of 20 to 30 feet in summer.
During most of the year, redears remain scattered, making it difficult to find schools. But during the spring/summer spawning season, they congregate in colonies to carry out their mating ritual. Bedding areas of 1/4 to 1/2 acre are found in some lakes, but the average “bed” has the same dimensions as a school bus. They like to nest in lily pads, usually in 2 to 8 feet of water, but you can find redears almost anywhere you might find bluegills: around cypress trees, brush, stumps and logs, or even on open sand and gravel bottoms.
Spawning begins when the water temperature nears 66 degrees Fahrenheit. Late April through early June is prime spawning time in Arkansas, but spawning may continue into August.
The redear’s major activity periods during the spawning season are thought by many anglers to be closely linked to periods of the full moon. Most experienced redear rustlers will tell you that feeding activity peaks from three days before the full moon until three days after. Between these periods, fishing takes a nosedive until the next phase stimulates further activity. This observation is totally unscientific, but experience shows that checking the moon and calendar, and using a fishing strategy that takes advantage of this presumed scenario, will help you catch more redears.
Redears are bottom feeders, and if you’re presenting your bait anywhere except very near or on the bottom, you’ll miss most of these fish. Most anglers expect to catch redears using the same techniques used for bluegills. But in most cases, this won’t work. Bottomfishing tactics are the only ones that regularly catch shellcrackers.
Redears are also finicky. They’re less likely to be caught on artificial lures than other panfish, and even when fishing with live bait, you have to determine the specific bait they want and the best way to present it.
Let me offer an example. Last year, a friend and I were fishing for redears on a small east-Arkansas lake. We were using almost identical ultralight spinning outfits while bottomfishing with worms, perhaps the premier redear bait. We were fishing the same bed of spawning fish. Problem was, my buddy was catching lots of redears, and I wasn’t catching any.
“I can’t figure it out,” I told him. “You’re catching ’em one after another, and I can’t get a nibble. And we’re doing everything the same.”
“Not everything,” he said. “You have a split shot on the line, and I don’t.”
I didn’t think adding a single tiny split shot could make any difference. But when I removed it from the line, I started catching redears.
Lesson? If you think you’re doing everything right but you’re not catching fish, vary your method of presentation ever so slightly. Even a small variation like a split shot may keep these persnickety devils from biting.
Perhaps the most important key to redear fishing success is picking a body of water where redears are abundant. In Arkansas, this isn’t difficult. Almost all the state’s lakes and many streams have healthy populations of redear sunfish. Among the best are lakes Bear Creek, Conway, Chicot, Bois d’Arc, Millwood, Merrisach, Cox Creek, White Oak, Hinkle, Catherine, Horseshoe and Felsenthal. No matter where you live in Arkansas, you’re just a short distance from good shellcracker waters.
Any angler who gets acquainted with redear sunfish will be abundantly repaid in good old-fashioned fishing fun. Redears are persnickety and hard to catch at times, but the possibility of catching a sunfish topping 1 1/2 or 2 pounds makes it all worthwhile. Don’t let summer pass without giving them a try on one of the many excellent lakes in Arkansas.