Yesterday was the first official day of summer, and the recent hot and humid weather can attest to that fact.

Some species of fish are more difficult to catch during the hot months of the year, but it is an ideal time to go perch fishing. I call them perch, but they really are members of the sunfish family. These fish also are called bream or panfish.

There are several species of sunfish, including bluegills, redears, long ears, red-breasted sunfish, green sunfish and warmouths. Other common names include brim, goggle eyes and rock bass.

You can fish for perch or bream with the most basic equipment. I remember as a kid I would cut a cane pole, attach some fishing line with a small hook, pinch on a splitshot sinker and attach a cork. Then with a can of freshly dug worms, it was off to the creek or pond to catch a mess of perch.

After cleaning the fish, my mother would batter them in corn meal and deep-fry them to a golden brown. Many people claim the besttasting fish is catfish or crappie, but a freshly caught bream fried to perfection is hard to beat.

Whatever you call them, they generally are easy to catch and a good fish for kids or first-time anglers.

The most common bait for perch is any kind of earthworms. Worms usually are available at convenience stores or sporting goods stores.

For kids, I would recommend a lightweight closed-faced spinning reel with about 6- to 8-pound test line.

Bream spawn all summer long, therefore the best place to catch them is on the bottom. The best method is to use a small hook baited with a worm. Attach one or two split-shot weights to keep the bait on the bottom.

I also use artificial bait to catch these prolific fish. I fish with an ultra-light spinning rod and reel with four-pound test line. Some of my favorite artificials are small 2- to 3-inch plastic worms, beetle spins, 1/8-ounce rooster tails and any small spinning lures such as a Mepps.

According to what I have read, only about one percent of licensed Texas anglers say they prefer to catch bluegills or other sunfish. I think this is a low figure, as almost all novice or young anglers begin their fishing careers by bank fishing for bluegills or other sunfish.

Sunfish are an important part of a fisheries food chain. Although they are a fishery unto themselves, the baby sunfish feed everything from bass to catfish.

The most common sunfish in the state is the bluegill. The generic name in Greek means “scaled gill cover.” The species name means “large hand,” which may refer to the body shape or its size.

Bluegills are distinguished from other sunfish by the dark spots at the base of the dorsal fin. The back and upper sides of the fish are usually dark olive green blending to lavender, brown, copper or orange on the sides, and reddishorange or yellow on the belly.

Because of their long spawning season, bluegills have a very high reproductive potential, which often results in overpopulation. Bluegills and other sunfish are found in creeks, rivers, ponds, lakes and virtually every body of water in Texas.

There are millions of them across the state, and it is almost impossible to over-fish them. Therefore, if you want a fish fry, keep the larger ones and throw the smaller ones back into the water. Next summer there will be a whole new crop ready to bite your worm-baited hook again.

On lightweight tackle, bluegills provide plenty of fight pound for pound as any other fish in Texas. Bluegills approaching two pounds have been caught in public waters, and fish over three pounds are known in private lakes, especially where they are fed a commercial fish food.

The Texas Parks and Wildlife official record book shows the state record bluegill weighed 2.02 pounds and was 12.5 inches long. Gibbs Milliken caught the fish in November 1999 in the Lampasas River with a fly rod with a #6 copper clouser minnow.

The largest bluegill on record was 4 pounds 12 ounces, landed in 1950 from Ketona Lake in Alabama.

Former Soil Conservation Service employee and longtime writer Mat Taylor offers his outdoors column for Dispatch Record readers. He can be contacted at (254) 518-2262 or via e-mail at mntaylor@wildblue.net.