those sure are some monsters...the only blue-gill i have ever caught that even remotely resembles them was one i caught when i was about 12 years old , fishing a private pond , on a johnson spoon......those fish are what i am searching for these days, a monster like that on a little bitty rod and reel would be a real battle i would never forget............and i was bass fishing , if i remember correctly the spoon was a johnson sprite , fairly big and all silver.......there was another spoon we use to use on the creeks back then , it was red with a white stripe on it ( i think it was white ) , but it was much smaller than the johnson spoon.