he is a large mouth bass in a 46 gallon bow front tank. right now he is about 3.5 inches and i was wondering how big he will get in the tank. will he just keep growing or grow to his environment. i am going to give him to my friend in his 180 gallon tank with other bass when he outgrows my tank. and also how fast will he grow like at what rate. for example how many inches per month and per year. please help!!!!!

While it's true that a small tank will limit a fish's growth, you need to think about WHY this happens.

It happens because conditions in the tank are not suitable for the fish any more. Not enough oxygen, polluted water, not enough food (restricting food to avoid polluted water) etc. These things are going to affect the fish in a bad way, stunting it's growth and eventually killing it. pets question and answers,www.5d2d.com

If you could somehow keep the water conditions perfect, maybe with continuous water changes, then many fish will keep growing until they can't turn around in the tank any more. But back in the real world of weekly water changes that doesn't happen.

So when you judge he's getting too big for the tank, or you notice his growth is slowing down, then it's time to move him to your friends bigger tank.

I would suggest you get him out of the tank when he reaches about 9", as that is 1/4 of the tank length. Going bigger than that is going to get crowded. Normally I would suggest 1/6th of the tank length, but with one large, and not particularly fast swimming fish, you could push that a little.

Ian

They can slow their growth to a certain degree, but do keep growing and will outgrow the tank!
Stunting occurs in high nitrate tanks or other poor water conditions and will cause internal organ failure as a result the fish will die before it outgrows the tank. pets question and answers,www.5d2d.com

Eventually they will produce so much waste and be so large that they can easily poison themselves with waste or reduce all the oxygen and die then as well.

I have seen a clown knife kept in a 40 gallon tank, perfect water quality because of the filtration method, grow literally nose to tail the size of the tank..no stunting or other health problems but was a sad fish that could not even turn around. I say him on craigslist and he has been rehomed.
In most cases the water quality kills them.

So a fish will only grow as large as the tank will allow, then it will die.

He will grow to the size of the aquarium but his growth will be stunted without be housed in a proper sized aquarium. Stunting your fish is healthy as the organs don't develop properly and become compressed.

He will grow to his environment.