ok, my job is done for the year….i contributed some info 
J/K……it may be insignificant to many, but i find fish biology pretty cool.
After female lays eggs and male fertilizes them, the male guards the nest and fluffs/rotates the egg mass. Tank scenarios show that egg laying can last roughly 4.5 hours. The females are usually removed because past experiences had shown that she may eat or crush the eggs. In these tank observations, males were very protective and would even attack the female if she was too close to the proximity of the nest and even be killed. Hatching occurrs in about 6-7 days. The male guards the hatched young, until they ventured off to rocky or riffle areas. From my personal experience, the fish I was seeing while working were roughly 55mm and they were probably young of the year fingerlings, this week we only saw a couple but they were about 80mm if I remember correctly. The young of the year are basically pushed around water currents and riffles until they are about 2-4 inches then they seek start to their common holding grounds. We also E-fished up a TON of little guys (under 15″) last week. More stuff that i remeber researching is that age II fish were about 14 inches, by age V they were 20 inches. Age XVI was about 38 inches…. them lengths came from a study on the Mississippi near the Iowa border, so there may be some variance up here. Around these parts i belive fish mature around age IV or V…about 15-18″ i think. Also, from what I already know, smaller flatheads have a white patch on their caudual fin which is a sign of being immature.
this is an extremely bried summary…..so correct me if i am wrong…
“
