Predators like smallmouth bass also help keep rusty numbers down by eating adults. Bass also love to eat bluegill and, when the lake was missing its cover of aquatic plants, bass hit them hard.
Today, schools of bass still thrive in the lake, but the addition of habitat via the regrowth of aquatic plants has allowed sunfish populations to coexist with their predators.
A bluegill hangs out in the underwater "forest."
