This is the time of year when the bluegill come to spawn. It's also the time when largemouth bass wrap up their love making and begin to think of food again. I love the drama that unfolds as these two species meet in the shallow sandy flats. It's a war of two fish that have warred since the early days of bass time.

Any normal fish would run and hide from giant bass, but not the bluegill. The bluegill must spawn next door to the bass. Instinct forces them to be there, and they know the bass will be there too. Inexorable is the word for it, and when the longest day of the year approaches the warring of these sunfish is inexorable.

Like pint sized hyenas the bluegill ease in to the beds hoping to snag a meal before the lion notices. Sometimes they make a mistake and become food themselves. Most afternoons it's just a dangerous dance as bluegills hover closer and the bass counter with sweeping attacks and raised fins. Watching the gyrations of a bluegill's pectoral fins as it moves back and forth can be hypnotic, not just to the bass.

For the largemouth it's a combination of hatred and hunger, but hatred first. Have you ever watched the two interact? Bass hate the sight of the bluegill, the thought of them, their very existence. If given the chance, a two pound bass will snatch a bluegill half his size by the throat and waddle off - a proud black lab bass with his bluegill duck. In the daytime spawning zone battle it's the bluegill that wins most skirmishes.

But as night falls the bass gain the advantage. The bluegill come to the surface to eat emerging insects and silhouetted there they form targets. The slicing attack of a bass through a pod of bluegill makes fingers fumble and backlashes explode. The magical moment is not at sunset, it is in the moments of final light. That's when the bass has his chance for revenge.

The war of bass and bluegill will never end.