Catch and Release

[byron cooley]

How many of you are 100% Catch and release with bass??? How many of you like a tasty bass filet once in a while??? Personaly, I love 1 1/2 - 2 pound bass filets on ocassion. I do keep a couple a month to eat. Last year my brother got tired of all the various bass club members giving him a hard time for keeping a couple bass to eat once in a while and they are the first ones to rip spawning females off their nests and transport them sometimes miles away for weigh in. So just for laughs he got this liscense for his tow vehicle.

 

[Chris Johnson2]

That is pretty funny. Me personally, I let them go. I just don't like to clean fish. I'll usually go to the sushi bar if I feel like fish. If there is a fish fry planned, now that is a different story. I say if its legal and you want to keep them, go for it.

 

[William H. (Bill) Barham]

Chris sounds exactly like me.



Bill

 

[Bruce Freeman]

I will fess up to the fact that I am to lazy to clean fish, so I let them all go. I don't mind cooking or eating fish. I can still remember when I was young and we would plan a fish fry, go down to the creek catch a mess of Bluegill, hunt up a few dozen crawdads and have a feast.

BF

 

[Ross Kline]

I too release all my fish, i can't stand the smell or taste of them. but I do love to fish.

 

[C C]

All catch & release unless a nice channel cat comes my way or I find my self fluke/flounder fishing then it's in the beer batter and fish fry time!



In NC when I fished with Bass-N-Gals, many moons ago I loved pre-fishing a tourney. We would put out cat lines after a good day of fishing we would go and pull the lines and bring up 3 or 4 nice 20+ pound channel cats and have a big fish fry the night before the tourney.



Cass

 

[Texas Transplant]

Our club does a 'fish fry' generally once a year after one of our 'away' tourneys. Always nice to do. Most other times, they all go back.



Tex

 

[Greg J.]

Catch and release for us also.

 

[TrepMan]

Byron - We're closer to you. I typicaly catch/release unless I get one nice 2lber that makes a great dinner for Beka and I (kids don't like fish anymore). Even when i'm in a school of stripers/Hybrids/crappie, I only keep enough for one meal maybe a second meal if I know family/friends are comming over.



Of course if I deep hook one, in the frying pan it goes.



Also, it depends on with me when I catch it/fish. I have been doing a lot of late evening fishing lately and I HATE cleaning fish at 10pm at night on a work night!!!



Taking the whole family out on Saturday, hope to catch a few nice hybrids (or bass) and fry them up on Monday with friends.



Trep

 

[TOMMY RICH]

Other than panfish or a walleye or two for tablefare...I'm into CPR!

 

[Michael S]

I will keep a few smaller bass at times....usually nothing bigger than 2.5 lbs....the smaller the better. But I would say 80% of the fish I catch get put back.

 

[fatrap]

I release all bass. Crappie/bluegill/walleye are eaters.

fatrap

 

[Larry Harp]

I heard an old man say one time, "If I want to eat fish, I'll go to Long John Silvers".



I'm like some of the others, I hate cleaning them more than anything...and I'll admit, I'm an old softie when it come to killing even a fish, espically a bass. I fish only for black bass, never interested in anything else so I feel a kind of relationship with them. I'm not judging any person who does keep a few because they do need to be thined out sometimes. I do hate to see a lunker die to become a wall ornament but that's up to the indivdual that catches it.



We do go after some Sand Bass occasionally and if we catch enough we will clean them........gross......but good to eat.



Harpo

 

[joe haley]

I release all my bass to me they taste too fishy but I will eat all the crappi and bluegill I can catch JD

 

[Jim in VA]

I'm mostly a catch-n-release kind of guy for bass. If you saw the pollution in the Potomac, you'd know why!! Seriously, although the Potomac has been cleaned up considerably, bacteria levels are still pretty darned high. Ever wonder why swimming in the Potomac around the DC area is illegal?



That said, I have caught a few bigger bass (one to two pound range) in the Occoquan reservoir that I've kept and eaten (WAY up near Fountainhead, away from the main Potomac stem). Largemouth filets work well in a fish fry! Cleaning fish is not that bad when you filet the rascals with a sharp knife. I don't even bother to gut or scale them anymore. But again, that's only about once a year.



When I've done saltwater fishing in the Chesapeake for stripers or out of NC in the Gulf Stream for mahi mahi or tuna, you bet I'm keeping and EATING those tasty guys!! Mmmmm - sushi-grade tuna steaks! Make mine medium-rare!!

 

[JAMES MOORE]

Though I'm primarily catch and release, I do keep an accassional bass for eating. I likes them basses fried with cole slaw and pork and beans

 

[Dan J.]

I cleaned up a mess of slab Crappie last night. I'm having my Mom and Dad up for a fish fry at lunch with my boys. When I'm in the mood for freshwater fish, I prefer Crappie or the occasional lost Lanier Walleye! (LOL!) The yearly Canada outing has a fish fry every day which holds me for a good bit. (Although, can you ever really get tired of Walleye?!) I pretty much C&R most everything else, unless a partner/client has a preference.

 

[JIM SHINN]

I release all bass. I love a good bluegill or crappie about once a year. I love saltwater fish better than freshwater fish. Flounder, weakies, kingfish, & striper. Occassionally a bluefish here and there as long as they are snapper blues.

 

[Andrew Zuber]

Pan-fried bluegills for dinner last night....mmmm mmmmm mmmmm GOOD!!!

As far as bass...If I happen to gut-hook one and I don't think it's going to survive, I'll take it home and subject it to my fillet knife...but normally I'm a CPR man (Catch, Photo, Release)...

Gills, crappie, walleye....they all know which drawer I keep the fillet knife in...



az

 

[TOMMY RICH]

I know what you mean Andy

The bluegill at CJ Brown are shaking in their boots right now!

 

[TritonGlenn]

I'm full catch and release on largemouth, spotted, smallmouth bass. Not because I am against anyone eating them. I just never cared for the taste of the few I have cooked up.



However, I like to eat most saltwater / brackish water species - Grouper, Snapper, Redfish, Speckled Trout, Flouder, Stripers, etc... On the freshwater side, I also really enjoy panfish and small catfish. I have buddies who like going for the really large catfish, but I prefer the taste of the smaller ones. I don't know of any of my friends that eat bass, but I don't think they eat much fish at all either.



Glenn

 

[Steve Hutson]

I'm 100% catch and release on all species of fish, but I can't find the fault in a person that legally catches and keeps a few bass or any other fish. The only reason that I don't keep a few is that I can't stand the taste of fish nor the smell when they are cooking.



Steve