Sugar white sands and clear, black, tannic acid waters create spectacularly beautiful contrasts in bright sunlight when filtered through stands of magnificent ancient cypress trees. Combine that with fast water swirling around and over huge fallen logs, plentiful wildlife, solitude, and one can visualize the unforgettable splendor of Florida’s Big Bend pristine rivers!
One of the prizes that lives in these little known waterways is the rare and always elusive Suwannee Bass. This diminutive member of the black bass family is rarely found anywhere on earth other than the Suwannee and Sante Fe Rivers systems in North-Central Florida and the Ochlockonee, St. Marks, and Wakulla Rivers in the Florida panhandle. Though it is often confused with the Smallmouth Bass from northern waters or the Shoal Bass from Georgia, the Suwannee Bass is more kin to the Florida Largemouth Bass.
Suwannee Bass are quite attractive, very scrappy, and are somewhat wider and thicker than other types of black bass. They are generally thought to be more abundant in the spring-fed lower reaches of the Santa Fe River, which is a tributary of the Suwannee River, but the largest population that I have personally seen is in the St. Marks River. These fish were not native to the river, but were stocked by local fishermen, and tend to be much smaller than those caught in waters where they are a native species.Read more….