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25-627: The Little Ocmulgee River is a 28.3-mile-long (45.5 km) tributary of the Ocmulgee River in the U.S. state of Georgia . 31°55′10″N 82°38′44″W  /  31.91935°N 82.64569°W  / 31.91935; -82.64569 This article related to a river in the US state of Georgia is a stub . You can help Misplaced Pages by expanding it . Ocmulgee River The Ocmulgee River and its tributaries provide drainage for some 6,180 square miles in parts of 33 Georgia counties ,

50-811: A largemouth bass was achieved in 1932 in Montgomery Lake, an oxbow lake off the Ocmulgee River in Telfair County . The record-setting fish, caught by farmer George Washington Perry, weighed 22 pounds, 4 ounces. The International Game Fish Association officially declared the world record for largemouth bass tied in 2010, following Manabu Kurita's catch (in July 2009) of a 22 pound, 4 ounce largemouth taken from Lake Biwa in Japan . There are some fifteen invasive species of fish which inhabit

75-779: A large section of the Piedmont and coastal plain of central Georgia. The Ocmulgee River basin has three river subbasins designated by the U.S. Geological Survey : the Upper Ocmulgee River subbasin ( hydrologic unit code 03070103); the Lower Ocmulgee River Subbasin (03070104); and the Little Ocmulgee River Subbasin (03070105). The name of the river may have come from a Hitchiti words oki ("water") plus molki ("bubbling" or "boiling"), possibly meaning "where

100-462: Is also located in many freshwater marsh wetlands. The favorite food of this sunfish is snails, which it obtains by cracking their shells, hence this feisty gamefish's common name: shellcracker. These fish meander along lakebeds, seeking and cracking open snails and other shelled creatures. VanderKooy et al. (2000) observed that large L. microlophus predominantly focus on hard-shelled prey such as ostracods , hydrobiid snails and mussels throughout

125-405: Is native to the southeastern United States . Due to its popularity as a sport fish , it has been widely introduced across North America . Redear sunfish generally resemble bluegill except for coloration and somewhat larger maximum size. The redear sunfish also has faint vertical bars traveling downwards from its dorsal. It is dark-colored dorsally and yellow-green ventrally. Unlike bluegill,

150-659: The Ocmulgee National Monument , a National Park Service -administered protected area established in 1936. Europeans first explored the Ocmulgee basin in 1540, during the expedition of the Spanish explorer Hernando de Soto and his party, who visited the late Mississippian chiefdom of Ichisi , now identified by archeologists as the floodplain south of Macon . The Ichisi served corncakes, wild onion , and roasted venison to De Soto and his party. Over

175-563: The "Ochese Creek Indians" (which the Spanish called "Uchese"), with a population of 2,406. Early 18th century maps show a total of twelve towns in the vicinity of Ochese Creek, many with names corresponding to towns that had been on the Chattahoochee River. The Muscogee -speaking towns of Coweta , Kasihta , Tuskegee, and Koloni were located on the north side of the cluster. Several of the Hitchiti -speaking towns were located to

200-491: The Altamaha shiner ( Cyprinella xaenura ) and two designated rare species, the goldstripe darter ( Etheostoma parvipinne ) and redeye chub ( Notropis harperi ). The Ocmulgee River is popular with anglers for its excellent fishing, particularly for redbreast sunfish , bluegill , redear sunfish , largemouth bass , black crappie , channel catfish , and flathead catfish . The world record for largest recorded catch of

225-679: The Ochese Creek towns moved west, mostly returning to the Chattahoochee River, where they evolved into the Lower Towns of the Muscogee Confederacy (referred to by the English as the "Lower Creeks"). Eli Whitney 's invention of the cotton gin stimulated development of short-staple cotton plantations in the uplands, where it grew well. The gin mechanized processing of the cotton and made it profitable. Demand for land in

250-608: The Ocmulgee basin about 10,000 to 15,000 years ago (see settlement of the Americas ). Scraping tools and flint spearpoints from nomadic Paleoindians hunters have been discovered in the Ocmulgee floodplain. In the Archaic period (c. 8000-1000 BCE) which followed, hunter-gatherers in Ocmulgee basin used fiber- tempered pottery and stone tools . During the Woodland period (c. 1000 BCE-900 CE), there were various villages in

275-883: The Southeast increased, as well as demand for slave labor in the Deep South. In 1806, the U.S. acquired the area between the Oconee and Ocmulgee rivers from the Creek Indians by the First Treaty of Washington . That same year United States Army established Fort Benjamin Hawkins overlooking the Ocmulgee Fields. In 1819 the Creek held their last meeting at Ocmulgee Fields. they ceded this territory in 1821. In

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300-632: The area, evidenced by earthen mounds and pottery sherds . There is evidence that the Mississippian culture reached the Ocmulgee basin by 900 CE; according to the New Georgia Encyclopedia , "on the Macon plateau and in the nearby Ocmulgee bottomlands, stretches of farmsteads and gardens constructed around elaborate ceremonial mounds are the most prominent evidence of this early Mississippian influence." These areas are now part of

325-573: The dam southeast past Macon , which was founded on the Fall Line . It joins the Oconee from the northwest (241 miles downstream from Jackson Lake) to form the Altamaha near Lumber City . The Ocmulgee River Water Trail begins from Macon's Amerson River Park to the confluence near Lumber city and Hazelhurst, encompassing approximately 200 miles. Four power plants in the Ocmulgee basin that use

350-547: The deep-water, mollusk-feeding niche allows it to be introduced to lakes without the risk of competition with fish that prefer shallower water or surface-feeding. In recent years, the stocking of redear has found new allies due to the fish's ability to eat quagga mussels , a prominent invasive species in many freshwater drainages. During spawning, males congregate and create nests close together in colonies, and females visit to lay eggs. The redear sunfish may occasionally hybridize with other sunfish species. The redear sunfish

375-595: The entire year. In the same field investigation, it was observed that smaller fish tended to also consume zooplankton , amphipods , chironomid and ceratopongonid larvae and cladocerans , with varied distributions depending on the season. They are also believed to feed on algae , aquatic worms , copepoda , midge larvae , ephemeropteran and odonata nymphs, crayfish , small fish, and fish eggs. Redear sunfish have thick pharyngeal teeth which allow them to crunch exoskeletons . They are even capable of opening small clams . The specialization of this species for

400-416: The largest representation in the river basin is Cyprinidae (carp and true minnows), with 27 species. It is followed by Centrarchidae (sunfish), which has 22 species. The Ocmulgee basin contains ten species in the family Ictaluridae (catfish) and eight species of in the family Catostomidae (suckers). The river basin is also inhabited by one State of Georgia-designated endangered fish species,

425-429: The male has a cherry-red edge on its operculum ; females have orange coloration in this area. The adult fish are between 20 and 24 cm (7.9 and 9.4 in) in length. Max length is 43.2 cm (17.0 in), compared to a maximum of about 40 cm (16 in) for the bluegill. Redear sunfish on average reach about 0.45 kg (0.99 lb), also larger than the average bluegill. Redear sunfish are native to

450-622: The next hundred years, however, the Native Americans in the area were devastated from disease and chaos following European contact . Between 1689 and 1692, a number of towns of the Apalachicola Province located on the Chattahoochee River moved to central Georgia, settling in the area of the Ocmulgee River, which the English at the time called Ochese Creek. In 1715, the English recorded ten towns among

475-421: The river after heavy rains caused widespread damage around Macon. Major creeks that flow into the Ocmulgee River include: Redear sunfish Pomotis microlophus Günther, 1859 The redear sunfish ( Lepomis microlophus ), also known as the shellcracker , Georgia bream , cherry gill , chinquapin , improved bream , and sun perch , is a freshwater fish in the family Centrarchidae and

500-861: The river basin. According to a Georgia Department of Natural Resources report, "many of these species are well-established and are detrimental to native fish populations. The fifteen invasives are threadfin shad ( Dorosoma petenense ), goldfish ( Carassius auratus ), grass carp ( Ctenopharyngodon idella ), blacktail shiner ( Cyprinella venusta ); common carp ( Cyprinus carpio ); flathead catfish ( Pylodictis olivaris ); white bass ( Morone chrysops ); morone hybrids ( Morone sp.); green sunfish ( Lepomis cyanellus ); longear sunfish ( Lepomis megalotis ); Lepomis hybrids ( Lepomis sp.); shoal bass ( Micropterus cataractae ); spotted bass ( Micropterus punctulatus ); white crappie ( Pomoxis annularis ); and yellow perch ( Perca flavescens ). Archeological evidence shows that Native Americans first inhabited

525-590: The river's water, including the coal-fired Plant Scherer in Juliette , operated by the Georgia Power Company . Plant Scherer is the seventh-largest power plant in the United States by capacity (based on 2016 data) , and the largest to be fueled exclusively by coal. A diverse array of fish—105 species in twenty-one families —inhabit the Ocmulgee River basin. The family with

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550-490: The same year, the McCall brother established a barge-building operation at Macon. The first steamboat arrived on the river in 1829. During the 19th century, the river provided the principal water navigation route for Macon, allowing the development of the cotton industry in the surrounding region. In 1842 the river was connected by railroad to Savannah . The river froze from bank to bank in 1886. In 1994 devastating floods on

575-605: The southeastern United States. They range from North Carolina to Florida , west to southern Illinois and Missouri , and south to the Rio Grande drainage in Texas . However, this fish has been widely introduced to other locations such as the states of Ohio and Arizona . In the wild, redear sunfish inhabit warm, quiet waters of lakes, ponds, streams, and reservoirs. They prefer to be near logs and vegetation, and tend to congregate in groups around these features. This sunfish

600-669: The southern part of the Ochese Creek cluster, including Ocmulgee, Hitchiti, and Osuchi. Two Muskogee-speaking towns from the Tallapoosa River in Alabama, Atasi and Kealedji, joined the cluster of towns around Ochese Creek, as did the Hitchiti-speaking town of Chiaha from western North Carolina. The Ochese Creek cluster also included Westo and Yuchi towns. Following the outbreak of the Yamassee War in 1715,

625-598: The water boils up." The river rises at a point in north central Georgia southeast of Atlanta , at the confluence of the Yellow , South , and Alcovy rivers. Since the construction of the Lloyd Shoals Dam in the early 20th century, these rivers join as arms of the Jackson Lake reservoir . The river's source is formed at an elevation of around 530 feet above sea level . The Ocmulgee River flows from

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