Hey everyone,
Just thought I'd share my largest catch of this past week. I hooked into this bowfin using a barbless Culprit worm rig while vacationing up in Minnesota. Great fun to bring in...landed up weighing a little over 8 lbs and was around 30".[cool]
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Nice fish and thanks for sharing. Please remember the picture size limits too.
Avatars at no more than 170 pixels wide. Normal pics at no more than 450 pixels wide.
Thanks again and keep the reports coming.[cool]
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Alright, I fixed the avatar....pardon my ignorance[laugh].
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No problem bro. We are glad to have you on this site. I'm sure you will enjoy it here just as many have.[cool]
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Bowfin are a fascinating fish, apparently the only one of its family of species remaining from the Cretaceous and Eocene periods. It actually has lungs.
The Bashakill swamp in NY state is home to a few of them. I have never caught one, but my wife has caught two on crankbaits.
-ABT
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Yeah, they really are an interesting fish. Direct descendants of the fabled Leedsichthys problematicus (the largest fish that ever existed!) I've come to discover. The bowfin isn't the only species of fish which have adapted lung-type appratuses; other air-breathing species I've come into contact with include bichir, some exotic cats, and lungfish, many of which only utilize their lungs when oxygen content falls to miserable levels or (in the wild) drought forces them to relocate to a nearby body of water. When this becomes a neccesity fish such as the bowfin and lungfish will literally emerge from their former dwelling and slowly lurch across land in search of deep mud or another aquatic setting. Note the thin "legs" on either side of a lungfish's body...indicative of the species former amphibial abilities lost through evolution.
Anyways, I agree, bowfin are fascinating fish; I always like catching something out of the ordinary anyway.[cool]
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