My bass buddies and their different tastes

I took this photo looking down into my pond standing about 5 foot up on the bank. As you can see I do have some of my fish named. On the left is Crybaby. Crybaby is a largemouth bass and is probably around 14" to 15" long. He likes to eat homemade biscuits, bread (in moderation), hotdogs, venison, hamburger, and chicken. He does not like pancakes at all and you can forget about commercial fish food - he won't even turn his eyes to look. He can tell the difference in a piece of pancake and a piece of biscuit before it hits the water - no joke! You don't have to believe it - I probably wouldn't if I hadn't seen it for myself time and time again. He's king of the beggars.

One thing I've noticed about the bass is that they will kinda lay on their side just a bit to look at you real well. You can click on the photo there to enlarge it and see that the bass are kinda leaning to the side but the bluegill aren't. The bass seem to always do that when they are peering up at me. Another thing I found with the bass is that when they take food from the bottom of the pond (or top for that matter) they will invariably take the food with the corner of their mouths. I got to thinking about this instead of dusting the living room and I seem to remember always taking the hook out of the corner of a basses - bass' ?? mouth and never out of the center. Could it be that they eat out of the corner of their mouths? That question is something to ponder while I should be dutifully washing dishes tomorrow...

Getting back to the photo... Behind Crybaby is Halfback. Halfback is a very differently colored bluegill. I think he's probably a hybrid bluegill as I know they're in my pond. I've caught bluegill up to 9 1/2 inches long in my pond and ole Halfback looks to be a bit larger than even they are. I think he's the largest one I have. About a third of his body is black. He usually doesn't get very close and isn't big on chasing around to get feed. Half the days he won't eat anything I throw in. He's content eating a bit of commercial feed now and then. I have never seen him nesting and he just seems to be an easy going kind of guy - never in a hurry and just slowly moves around in there fanning his black tail in front of the bass as if to say, "I got too big to eat HA HA HA HA". I've never caught him and probably never will as he isn't very eager. I only have a few of my bluegills named.

Over to the right is George. George is another largemouth bass and looks to be a twin to Crybaby. I have been asked how I tell them apart. It's like this... Crybaby is always on the left and he won't allow George to get on that side. I don't know why so don't ask. That's just the way it is down at the pond and those are the rules and the rules are obeyed.

There are many, many more characters who live in the pond and I'll save them for other days. I've got to figure out how this journal thing works and if there is some kind of button that will email my poor old mother each time I update...

Bye for now - I have to go to the pond.