Largemouth bass for food

Florida is exploring raising L.M. as a food source. Before the tournament guys head explode. My guess it would be similar to catfish, bluegills, tilapia, seafood and gators. Raised in Private water. Time to reach harvestable weight would be pretty good. Will be interesting to see where it goes. It might take a little heat off the gulf and ocean. A lot of Florida has, and is being drained for agriculture. Sending too much fresh water, and nutrients to the gulf. Killing the grass and everything else in the process.
This may add value to retain or restore marsh and swamp areas. Don’t know how to do links. But info at “myfws largemouth for food”

Interesting. I have eaten them and they are not bad. This is also dependent on the water they are coming from. I assume the said bass would not be harvested from public waters, but from ponds, phosphorus pits, etc. Same as Tilapia. If that is the case, then what would be the issue? I have cousins in Florida that make a living harvesting and selling Tilapia from ponds, phosphorus pits, not public waters. I hear they net some huge LMB and have to release them. I say a good deal. I would much prefer to eat a LMB out of decent water, than Tilapia. Tilapia to me is like a white bass, with the vein and orange meat still attached to the fillet, harvested out of warm/hot water. Firm and dense, not my first, second, or third choice. Edible yes, but…..

I have eaten them if I get into a few smaller ones while panfishing in cold water. breaded and fried you cannot distinguish a smaller LMB from a crappie, IMO.

KPE wrote:

I have eaten them if I get into a few smaller ones while panfishing in cold water. breaded and fried you cannot distinguish a smaller LMB from a crappie, IMO.

Agreed. But warm water bass are mushy. Cold water smaller bass are just like walleye. They taste like what ever you fry them in

KPE wrote:

I have eaten them if I get into a few smaller ones while panfishing in cold water. breaded and fried you cannot distinguish a smaller LMB from a crappie, IMO.

I have eaten plenty of LMB. My family was not into walleye when I was young and that and pan fish is all we ate for fish. They are good eating out of the right water and the smaller the better, but to say you can’t tell the difference between them and crappies is a bit of a reach I feel, unless you are getting crappies out of muddy holes. However everyone has there own taste buds.

I feel this is a good idea as they are very resilient fish and probably easily sustainable.

Makes sense, they’re a tough fish and probably a pretty easy, low-maintenance (and low-cost) fish to raise in captivity with the right resources. I assume they’d be going more into fish products than throwing the fillets out next to the rainbow trout and salmon in the seafood case. You probably wouldn’t be able to tell the difference in a fish stick made from bass as opposed to pollock or haddock.

X2 on LMB arent bad at all to eat. I will only eat the smaller ones and typically only in the winter.

Realize that the bass they intend to raise are not the same genetic species as the northern strain we have here. The ones down south are Florida strain largemouth bass which grow much larger and are not tolerant of cold water temps of any kind. Not sure if they taste any different than a northern strain, as I’ve never caught or eaten a Florida strain largemouth.

Bearcat89 wrote:

<div class=”d4p-bbt-quote-title”>KPE wrote:</div>
I have eaten them if I get into a few smaller ones while panfishing in cold water. breaded and fried you cannot distinguish a smaller LMB from a crappie, IMO.

Agreed. But warm water <strong class=”ido-tag-strong”>bass are mushy. Cold water smaller <em class=”ido-tag-em”>bass are just like walleye. They taste like what ever you fry them in

Normally I agree with almost everything you say. But in this instance I have never had a mushy Bass. If you take a live Bass bleed it and get it cooled down right away they’re as firm as any fish anytime of the year. I’m a hundred percent open to people proving me wrong though.

(Do to the DNR recommendations) I’ve cleaned and cooked a lot of smaller bass and if eaten fresh they are as good as any freshwater fish. I cook rock, largemouth and smallmouth bass on a regular basis for people. They can’t tell the difference between them and panfish. In fact most can’t even tell the difference between a mid summer bass and walleye.

@bearcat89 Next time you’re up my way in the summer I’ll make ya some!

why are we wasting our time with Bass when we have a carp infestation problem that could maybe be solved by making carp into food? Ive never eaten carp but from what i understand it was the fish of choice for many of our ancestors before it went out of favor.

crappie55369 wrote:

why are we wasting our time with Bass when we have a carp infestation problem that could maybe be solved by making carp into food?

We also have a pike problem and the daily bag limit is 10 in most of the state. Its an underutilized resource and many ecosystems would greatly benefit from increased harvest of small pike.

gimruis wrote:

<div class=”d4p-bbt-quote-title”>crappie55369 wrote:</div>
why are we wasting our time with Bass when we have a carp infestation problem that could maybe be solved by making carp into food?

We also have a pike problem and the daily bag limit is 10 in most of the state. Its an underutilized resource and many ecosystems would greatly benefit from increased harvest of small pike.

Bones and diet. Carp are bottom feeders boney and can taste like the bottom of the pond. Although tilapia farms raise hydroponic vegetables on the tanks. That absorbs the nutrients aka poop, and oxygenates the water. Bass would give better boneless fillets for the food market. More similar to other white fish people are accustom to. Other bright point when the hurricane comes. And it will. The dikes break or overflow. You are dispersing bass not carp. Reproducing carp for any reason is frowned on if not legal in most states for that reason. My wife and I used to fish pool 9 mid 80’s. Before the heavy pressure hit. 50 plus bass days were the norm. When 12” was the size limit. We would keep 2- 12”or 13”. Best fish sandwich for lunch. Beats the over fished cod from Mickey D’s.

crappie55369 wrote:

why are we wasting our time with Bass when we have a carp infestation problem that could maybe be solved by making carp into food? Ive never eaten carp but from what i understand it was the fish of choice for many of our ancestors before it went out of favor.

There is currently a campaign to rename Asian Carp and have them become more palatable to consumers(and stop racism….). They were supposed to announce a new name back in July or August, but I can’t seem to find anything that says they actually announced anything.

Asian Carp could very easily be renamed “garden fertilizer” or something that’s more in-line with where they should be relocated to.

As far as the eating largemouth bass goes, I agree with the comments that a smaller bass from cold water (or bled out and thrown on ice from warm water) is extremely similar to crappie or even walleye if you’re frying them. Their bone structure makes them easy to clean. They are plentiful and seem to have an expanding range as many bodies of water in the Midwest have steadily increasing water temps. There are a lot of people and areas where eating bass is going to become more prominent than ever before if a fish fry is the goal. With harvest pressure, technology, and environmental changes walleyes have a lot of things working against them.

One of the best largemouth bass outings I ever had was on early ice tip ups about 5 years ago. We must have caught 40-50 of them from 30 minutes before sunrise until probably only 11am. We had ~15 tip ups in but never could keep them all in during the feeding frenzy. We had several in the 4-5# range and 0 dinks. We did keep x6 of the smallest ones that were about 15″ long and mixed them in with some walleye we had in the fryer. Nobody knew the difference.

Another thing to keep in mind from the OP is that bass grow much faster down south in warm waters than they do up here. It takes a bass about a decade to reach 20 inches/5 pounds here.

buckybadger wrote:

One of the best largemouth bass outings I ever had was on early ice tip ups about 5 years ago. We must have caught 40-50 of them from 30 minutes before sunrise until probably only 11am. We had ~15 tip ups in but never could keep them all in during the feeding frenzy. We had several in the 4-5# range and 0 dinks. We did keep x6 of the smallest ones that were about 15″ long and mixed them in with some <em class=”ido-tag-em”>walleye we had in the fryer. Nobody knew the difference.

Agree – Bass on tip-up is great fun when you get on a bite, usually they’re mixed in with the pike and if you’re on a lake with smaller pike, the bass are the preferred target. Guessing those Big Ladies are producing eggs and need to eat, because they always seem to be big in the winter. In fact my biggest LM came on a tip-up. We keep them on occasion as well, and they’re just fine. I think next summer I’m going to try a grilled whole Largemouth.

Not thinking about this post. Today I was reading a Natural Heeling Foods book. Trying to fight cholesterol. Fresh water bass have the highest amount of Omega 3 of any freshwater fish, including trout. Also, higher than halibut, pollock, cod, snapper, sea trout and several other saltwater fish. Sure that would help marketability. I fish a private 15-acre lake with a DNR recommendation that no 11″ to 18″ bass be returned to the lake, due to overpopulation. 12″ to 15″ are perfect chunked and fried. Or put in foil, with olive oil or butter. With onion, peppers, mushrooms, asparagus lemon or lime. And what my wife refers to as too much garlic pepper. Wrap up and about 12 minutes on a medium grille. Or till it flakes apart. Water will clear to 10′ visibility. You can see school after school of 100, 6-8” yearling bass. Far more than the 10 to 100 per acre recommended. Farming bass may also provide opportunities for catch and release or trophy fishing.
.

Joe Scegura wrote:

Normally I agree with almost everything you say. But in this instance I have never had a mushy Bass. If you take a live Bass bleed it and get it cooled down right away they’re as firm as any fish anytime of the year. I’m a hundred percent open to people proving me wrong though.

Joe, I’ve had “mushy” bass when water is very warm and they aren’t bled. As you indicated prep is important, or just don’t keep them out of warm water (my approach). But I agree given a comparable sized fillet and proper prep, nobody is going to tell the difference between deep fried crappie and deep fried LMB.

Bass for food?

Fall river walleyes say….yes please.

Attachments:

1. 

   IMG_20181003_000210749-scaled.jpg
   

I mean, largemouth and smallmouth bass ate both sunfishes, so it stands to reason they’d eat similarly to a bluegill or crappie.

I’ve wanted to try keeping smaller 12-14” bass to eat for a while now.