Is a Bluegill a Sunfish? What's the Difference?

Yes, the bluegill is a sunfish. So what is the difference between a sunfish and a bluegill? A sunfish is a member of at least one of two groupings of fish. First, we have the genus Lepomis or the true sunfishes. This contains fish you might be familiar with like bluegill, redbreast sunfish, green sunfish, pumpkinseed, and redear sunfish. It also includes fish you might not be familiar with like warmouth, orangespotted sunfish, dollar sunfish, longear sunfish, redspotted sunfish, northern sunfish, spotted sunfish, and bantam sunfish. It is accurate to call any of these fish a sunfish but it is wrong to call anything besides a bluegill, a bluegill. Some anglers don't know the rest of these fish exist and just call any fish from Lepomis a bluegill. Another interesting fact is that most, if not all of the species in Lepomis can hybridize with each other. For some fishing records and awards any fish in Lepomis will qualify as a sunfish for their purposes.

The second grouping of fish that are known as sunfishes is the family Centrarchidae. A reference to this grouping of fish by anglers is less common, but those in the know will still use it. Centrarchidae contains 38 species of fish, so to keep this question and answer short we will not list them all. Centrarchidae does contain the genus Lepomis we previously discussed, as well as black basses, crappies, rock basses, and banded sunfishes. So yes the bluegill is a sunfish by being a member of Lepomis and a member of Centrarchidae.

The third thing you might have to consider is that in some place and time, the common name of sunfish was given to a specific species of fish. But seeing how many sunfishes are out there, you hopefully agree that it doesn't make much sense or seem fair to bestow that name on a single species. This is mostly historical at this point but you might still come across some local people who say that one particular species is the only sunfish.

Freshwater Fishing