Any photos or stories about rare or odd looking fresh water fish caught ?

I've got a few fish stories.

-A few years ago I was fishing in a delayed harvest section of my local creek and caught an ~8" Largemouth Bass which is itself a rare species for this creek but even more weird was that it had a horizontal yellow stripe instead of a black one. Very odd and I've never see a bass like that since then.

-Not fishing but while scuba diving I'm Summerville Lake in WV, I encountered a ~16" melanistic smallmouth bass that was entirely jet black that followed me around the dive for about 10 minutes.

-While trolling in Erie last July, I was bringing up a cannonball with the lure still on the clip from 100' down in 133 FOW of off Northeast and I saw a fish twirling off of the spoon about 60 feet back. I unclipped the spoon and reeled the fish in thinking another big yellow perch with eyes too before its stomach, but soon realized we were too deep to catch them on anything, trolling or otherwise. I brought in the fish and sure enough it was a 20" 5# Chinook Salmon. No fight whatsoever so it must have been dragged around for a while and the dang clip didn't work right. Sure did taste good, though!

-A few years ago on 4th of July weekend we were drift fishing in PIB at night while watching the downtown fireworks. I hooked in to something big and eventually it came to the surface next to the boat and it looked around 26-30". To me it looked like a Walleye as it was the traditional greenish yellow color that bay 'eyes have but I swear I saw a barbel or two on it. My dad said it was a channel catfish but the mouth shape looked too predatory and the color was off. Sure enough, the fish broke the 6 pound test I was using at the time and swam away before we could boat it. Maybe it was a Burbot? But I highly doubt such a cold water fish would still be in the bay during the heat of summer in 77° water.

-Fishing in marina lake spring 2014 at the lagoons entrance. We were catching sunfish, small perch, and the occasional largemouth. Suddenly, I see a slow moving head poke out of the surface to the left side of the entrance with about a 12' wake from its large body behind it. At the right side were several adult and juvenile ducks. The head submerged and the wake disappears for about 5 minutes. Then, a huge splash and one of the ducks is dragged under, never coming back up. 3 minutes later, another duck goes under before all that were left finally fly away. Keep in mind, this splash had the size and noise of somebody throwing a bowling ball directly down at the water. To this day I have no idea what it was and the combination of that, stepping on the spine of a bullhead, and almost getting bitten by a water snake are why I limit myself to only swimming, snorkeling, and diving in the main lake now.

This is probably the weirdest thing I've pulled out of Presque Isle Bay, which is saying something.
 
P.I. is a prehistoric playground, full of ancient fish, but if you think gar and bowfin are old, check this guy out-- Unchanged since the Cambrian period--500,000,000 years ago.  Actually, I should say "these guys." It's a colony of zooids called a Pectinatella magnifica, a freshwater bryozoan. Each rosette contains 10-18 zooids and each zooid has whorls of microscopic tentacles that they use to catch food in the water. Inside is a translucent jelly. This one was a little bigger than my hand, but they can get up to 2 feet!
 
Ended up on my hook while jigging underwater brush. Was hesitant to touch it, but they don't sting. Very lightweight and float through the water with ease.  
 

 
 

I've seen bryozoa at a few local lakes. Arthur and loyalhanna for sure. I have a few weird fish pics that im sure I've posted before, but photobucket is down for maintenance . Ill try and put them up later.

Although not quite exotic, a couple of years ago at Elk Creek I got a few of those Humpback (I don't know what the correct name is ) Salmonoids that showed up at Erie. It was different for sure. I threw it back, but was sure that no one would believe me until until more showed up. Now, this was before the internet & I never carried a camera. Was kinda pretty I thought.  sam

Speaking of hungry guys !


 

Amazing what you see sometimes. I found a huge Walleye dead up at Pymatuning on the shore years ago same situation . Had a big Yellow Perch jammed in it's mouth .
 
Mr. Crappie , every now and then you hear a few Pink Salmon caught in the Erie Tribs over the years. I think Michigan might of or did stock them, maybe Canada too.  

CAPTAIN HOOK
Amazing what you see sometimes. I found a huge Walleye dead up at Pymatuning on the shore years ago same situation . Had a big Yellow Perch jammed in it's mouth . Mr. Crappie , every now and then you hear a few Pink Salmon caught in the Erie Tribs over the years. I think Michigan might of or did stock them, maybe Canada too.  

They escaped from a hatchery on Lake Superior in Canada (I want to say Thunder Bay Area). The hatchery was originally farming them for a Hudson Bay stocking program which wound up failing miserably. So, they had a few thousand young fish left at the hatchery right on a north shore trib and thought that they couldn't survive or reproduce in superior's conditions so they drained the fry down in to the tribs. A few years later and adults are spawning in tribs quite successfully. Eventually find their way to the south shore of superior, then down to Lake Huron, and from there both Michigan and Erie and ultimately Ontario too. I'd say they're most abundant by far in Lake Superior now though with Huron coming in at second best fishery for them in the Great Lakes.

That is one ugly fish ! Looks like half bat ! I'd cut the line on that one ! LOL     ?

Have caught (and released, of course) a number of PA endangered species over the years, including Spotted Gar. No shortage of them in P.I. Bay.
 

 
 

Some great catches there, Maynard! I'm hoping to get in to some gar from boat this season. If you want a really good spot for Warmouth, shoot me a PM, I've got a great spot in the bay, lots of 8-14" fish.

Never caught big Warmouths but lots of smaller ones. Hartstown Swamp is fairly loaded with them. Never knew what they were years ago thought they were just a cross of Bluegill / Rockbass. Good picture !

Wow, that looks like a prop wound, fresh and deep too. Did you get the two weeks later catch on film? I'm wondering how much it had healed in two weeks.

Someone posted a fantail Steelie a few years ago from Erie might be the same fish. Wild looking thing. Big Steve that Steelie looked about the same two weeks later. Took off fine after releasing it again. Doubt that it faired well, but who knows .