FLORIDA - STRAIN BASS C HANGED the W ORLD of F ISHING
By Bill Rice
hese days bass over 10 pounds are a dime a dozen, but few of today’s bass anglers know the complete history of why “big bass” are so prevalent. The story actually began thanks to a vision of a Cal- ifornian spurred on by an inquis- itive pro baseball player. That man was Orville Ball, fisheries biologist and head of the recre- ation program for the City of San Diego Recreation Department from the mid-50s until around 1969. It was back in 1959 after a fishing trip with friends that Ball had the idea to experiment with the introduction of Florida-bred largemouth bass into the waters of Southern California.
According to Jim Brown, Ball’s successor at the San Diego City Lakes from 1974- 2003, “Orville was fishing for crappie at Lake Henshaw with Rolla Williams (outdoor writer) and baseball player Ray Boone. It was Boone who wondered aloud why the bass he caught during spring training in Florida were so much larger than those in his hometown of San Diego. “This led to a discussion in the boat of whether the fish were genetically different relative to growth potential or the issue was environmental. Orville decided to do some research and came across a thesis on the sub- ject that had been written many years before by America’s top fisheries biologist, Carl
44 SILVER EAGLES _ July 2011
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Bill Rice literally watched Florida-strain largemouth bass grow into their record-breaking dimensions while serving as editor for WON, Western Bass and WON BASS.
Hubbs, who coincidently was in charge of Scripps Institution of Oceanography at the time. They met, and while neither man was certain that the fish were different, they agreed it would be an interesting experi- ment to finally find out. Orville told me many times that he would not have pursued the experiment without Hubbs’ encourage- ment of such an experiment,” noted Brown.
Skeptics scoffed at the idea, too, saying that the big bass in Florida (which grew larger than any other largemouth bass in the nation) were simply a product of Florida’s warm, near-tropical environment. When transported to other waters, these Florida-bred bass would adapt to the local conditions and become “just another bass.” Boy, were they wrong.