Seeing spots

Nobody is pointing fingers, but spotted bass are thought to have been introduced into Lake Keowee by fishermen from Georgia, where spotted bass thrive and grow to more than respectable sizes in Lake Lanier.

Because spotted bass tend to be a more prolific breeding fish as well as an aggressive feeding fish, the new species quickly replaced largemouth bass as Keowee’s primary black bass species. No one, other than fisheries biologists, gave much thought to the swap-over in targeted bass species, because the spotted bass were a quarry not widely found at the time and they fight hard on sporting tackle.

But spots do present issues. Dan Rankin, a fisheries biologist for the S.C. Department of Natural Resources, summed up the problem.

“At Keowee, the prolific breeding of spotted bass turned against all species involved,” he said. “The largemouth bass continued to suffer as well as the little-known native redeye bass, which were found to hybridize with spotted bass. Even Keowee’s black crappie populations, scratching out an existence in the upper creek arms of the lake, were finding it hard to out-compete spotted bass for the infertile lake’s food supply.

“Bass fishermen have done an outstanding job instilling the practice of catch-and-release into their sport,” he said. “The problem is this tradition was passed on to the spotted bass, so instead of harvesting this fish and helping control their numbers, they were returned to the lake. The problem is compounded because the more spotted bass that inhabit the lake, the less food there is, even for their own species, so the spotted bass growth rates are stunting.”

Recent regulation changes have lowered the daily creel limit for largemouth and smallmouth bass to five, while keeping the limit at 10 for Lake Keowee spots — trying to get fishermen to keep more spots.

“The spotted bass is in the sunfish family, which means they have a white, flaky meat and are generally considered to be good to eat,” he said. “I suggest if you fish on Lake Keowee and catch some spotted bass, take them home and eat them.”