Catch and Release? Advice Needed

[richsurfer]

After the recent bass C & R discussions I’m just after some broader reasoning on the subject – not just ‘don’t take home (for food) the fish you catch’, which I think is only a valid attitude if you don’t eat fish.

 

As a newcomer to sea fishing, personally I've found it difficult even dealing with the deaths of my mackeral so I've been in a bit of a quandary over what to do - whether to take any fish for the table at all.

 

Do all you catch and releasers not eat any fish at all?

 

Myself and family regularly enjoy different fish from the supermarket - now I've started catching some myself I admit I don't like the process of killing them to eat. But to not do so would make me a hypocrite - there's also the fact that for every one fish you or I buy from the supermarket others will have died needlessly as by-catch or spoiled on their way to the shops, not to mention other organisms harmed in the process.

 

Obviously feelings run high over bass but what about all the other species?

I keep hearing that the cod population is on the brink of irreversible collapse and the size of the humble mackeral they are stocking in the supermarkets seems to be tinier than ever.

 

Sorry about the rambling but I have a bit of a crisis of conscience :confused: .

[spanner]

I like eating fish but I never, ever buy it from a supermarket or fishmonger to eat. Not because of some well thought out, environmentally reasoned arguement, but simply because I find shop bought fish absolutely cr@p compared to my own rod caught fish, that is really fresh.

 

Just looking at the stuff on offer in most supermarkets puts me right off, yellow, mushy, smelly, yuccy.....I wouldn't give it to my cat if I had a cat.

 

Humans have evolved to be omnivorous, so fish is a perfectly sensible thing to eat, and its good for you, very good in fact.

 

If you want organic and value quality you can't beat fresh rod caught fish.

 

However, it should be harvetsed in an environmentally sutainable manner and that is where most commercial activities fall over, and some 'angling' practices as well.

 

You should only ever take enough for your own needs.

 

You should pay attention to certain vulnerable species, wheteher it be due to spawning size, slow growth, or whatever.

 

You should pay attention to returned fish and handle them carefully to make sure they survive.

 

There are some species I wouldn't take for the pot, for example skate (I'd need a bloody big pot), spurdog ( I can't kill a fish that is as old as me), mullet, and smoothounds. But I do take mackerel, cod, pollack, ling, dab, flounder (but not from an estuary), bass, doggies (yummy), and I would take plaice or bream if I could catch one.

 

But to be honest, I don't actually catch many, so its a treat when I do

 

No reason why you can't have a full belly and a clean conscience.

[JRT]

I love fish but actually think bass are overrated for eating. No one bothered with them 20 years ago.

 

My reason for 100% C&R is that they are the only sea fish we have other than sea trout that can be considered a sports fish and grow to a decent size (if allowed). I think killing the fish that gives me sport just seems dumb to me? I wouldn't kill a sea trout or salmon either as I respect them to much and they look better alive than in the freezer.

 

I have no problem with someone killing 'a' 3lb fish for the table though. But I get really angry when I see large fish systematically killed. The people who do this either don't understand the damage they are doing or are basically fishmongers.

 

JRT

[SpeciMan]

My views are similar to Spanners. For me decisions on catch and release come down to the species concerned, the size of the fish, its growth rate and whether stocks are threatened.

 

Like Spanner I would prefer to catch my own rather than buy from the supermarket; they taste fresh and haven't been left out for days on end. However, like Rich there is also the by-catch issue with me. I know no other fish were wasted.

 

As for species I guess the only one I would eat regulary are mackeral. My list of occasional fish which I 'may' take are bream, gurnard, plaice, flounder, sole, codling (3-5lbs) and very occassionaly bass. In practice I've only ever taken mackeral, bream, flounder and sole.

 

Rich - I'm not so sure if mackeral stocks are thin on the ground. If anything mackeral are becoming more of a year round species down here.Does anyone know otherwise? - I'd be interested to find out.

[Leon Roskilly]

Similar thread recently on the general sea fishing forum.

 

See:

 

http://www.anglersnet.co.uk/ubb/ultimatebb...t=005624#000000

 

Tight Lines - leon

[Leon Roskilly]

SpeciMan:

I'm not so sure if mackeral stocks are thin on the ground. If anything mackeral are becoming more of a year round species down here.Does anyone know otherwise? - I'd be interested to find out.

The commercial quotas for mackerel were cut this year.

 

See ICES advice on mackerel at:

 

http://www.ices.dk/committe/acfm/comwork/r...oct/mac-nea.pdf

 

If you handle a mackerel it is likely to die, so if you are going to return a mackerel try to shake it off without touching them.

 

Tight Lines - leon

 

[ 09. September 2005, 10:09 PM: Message edited by: Leon Roskilly ]

[Simon Everett]

Right Richsurfer. The whole catch and release thing is not about not killing anything - even BASS do not advocate pure catch and release, what we do advocate though is RESTRAINT.

 

The idea behind catch and release with a "slot size" for keepers - with a limit on the number you take in a day/week/month/year/lifetime - it doesn't really matter.

As a newcomer you will not be familiar with the very common occurance of a couple of blokes out in a small boat fishing together and they happen to find a shoal of bass in a feeding frenzy. Those two blokes have a fantastic day of fishing and catch 73 bass between them - and at the end of the day those 73 bass are all lying dead on the bottom of the boat. The two chaps are exhausted but happy and they come home with big beaming faces and everyone on the quay crowds round to look at the fantastic haul of bass they have achieved. Then there is the dawning of realisation - what are they going to do with them all? They begin by giving a few away, but the ones they caught in the morning have gone all limp and the meat is falling apart, no good even for pot bait. So they dump them in the harbour and the crabs and prawns have a feast.

 

That scenario is not made up - even as recent as 10 years ago that exact thing was happening up and down the coast every so often. It happens with mackerel too.

 

The whole idea of a size limit was introduced in 1992 to try and prevent that wholesale slaughter of immature bass - and at the same time the education process began to try and get anglers to practise some restraint with their fishing. Black bream shoal in their thousands and it is easy to wipe a shoal out - that happened in a similar way to the above story until the charter skippers suddenly realised that their catches were very sparse so they introduced a 2 fish limit per angler for blak bream - it is still in force today but it isn't legal. It is just the skippers' rule and if you don't want to swim home.....

 

So the whole basis of the catch and release is to be selective over the fish you choose to take home - selective with which ones and selective over how many. None of us are going to press for nothing to eat at all - we are just careful. In the case of bass, select fish between 3lbs and 5lbs because they are the ones in the main bulk of the population and they have spawned twice - taking a few of those each year does no harm whatever and they are good to eat if you bake them slowly in white wine with a bit of butter and lemon juice.

On the mackerel front it is easy, because they are relatively eay to catch when they are about - from the shore normally at high water. On the kayak or the boat we catch mackerel on the way out for bait - so when we have caught a dozen or so we go out and go fishing, we have enough bait. For eating mackerel stop on the way in and catch a few. They go off very quickly in the summer and even in a coolbox with ice block they are starting to seperate by the time you come in - hence the bait ones in the morning and eating ones from the afternoon.

 

I hope that helps you understand the philosophy behind the catch and release thing. Sometimes a big bass is badly hooked - if the hook has gione in its gills for instance and damaged them BADLY, then it is no good trying to put it back, it will die anyway, so don't waste it. Again - selectivity.

[Zzippy]

SpeciMan:

My views are similar to Spanners. For me decisions on catch and release come down to the species concerned, the size of the fish, its growth rate and whether stocks are threatened.

 

Like Spanner I would prefer to catch my own rather than buy from the supermarket; they taste fresh and haven't been left out for days on end. However, like Rich there is also the by-catch issue with me. I know no other fish were wasted.

 

As for species I guess the only one I would eat regulary are mackeral. My list of occasional fish which I 'may' take are bream, gurnard, plaice, flounder, sole, codling (3-5lbs) and very occassionaly bass. In practice I've only ever taken  mackeral, bream, flounder and sole.

 

Rich - I'm not so sure if mackeral stocks are thin on the ground. If anything mackeral are becoming more of a year round species down here.Does anyone know otherwise? - I'd be interested to find out.

Your right there Speciman.

Mackeral were being caught December and Jan on Chessil beach

[Hungry Fisherman]

i hear its more to macky dying than just being touched depends on the damage the hook does and how mutch energy they used fighting you more than just the shock of being touched

 

could some post some facts on this or clear it up as a myth?

[Leon Roskilly]

Hungry Fisherman:

could some post some facts on this or clear it up as a myth?

I wrote to a senior scentist in CEFAS about this recently:

 

"Hi Mike,

 

I wonder if you can answer this, or pass it onto someone who can?

 

Frequently the question of returning mackerel alive appears on the various angling internet forums.

 

There is a belief by many that once a mackerel has been touched by an anglers hands, even though the fish may swim away energetically, it is doomed.

 

Something to do with the heat/oil of the anglers hands (where it has been touched can often be seen as a handmark on the fish's skin).

 

Even though only microscopically damaged, the mackerel's skin continues to break down with death inevitable within 30 hours.

 

Shaking the fish off the hook or handling with wetted neoprene gloves is said to prevent the problem.

 

The problem is that when the mackerel shoals are on the beach, anglers will soon catch their self-imposed limit, but can't seem to stop fishing, often changing from feathers to a light spinning outfit and returning every fish they catch.

 

(If the above is correct, then they are better advised to cease fishing for mackerel and trying for the bass beyond/underneath the shoals perhaps, with less guarantee of catching).

 

Although this information is widely quoted, I can't find any authoritive reference to such information, although I vaguely mention talking to someone from CEFAS at the Recreational Angling Conference in Cardiff some years back, who confirmed that was the case.

 

It would be useful to quote an authoritive source to refer people (one way or the other) to when the subject comes up in the future.

 

 

Tight Lines - Leon Roskilly

Sea Anglers' Conservation Network (SACN)

 

SACN Latest: http://www.anglers-net.co.uk/sacn/latest

 

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Leon,

 

You are quite correct, and you've come to the right people!

 

In the late 1970s we carried out several experiments to try to find out why dead mackerel were being found in vast numbers in the SW, co-incident with the purse seine and trawl winter fishery.

 

The short answer is that the fish died due to skin damage interfering with their ability to maintain osmotic balance, and the skin damage was due to abrasion between crowded fish in the nets.

 

We found that mackerel caught on barbless hooks and never handled, just dropped into keep tanks or nets, survived quite well if allowed to swim freely, but holding a mackerel caused enough damage to eventually kill it, sometimes two days later.

 

I have a number of publications showing the results of all this work, and I can send you the most relevant if you send me your home address.

 

These are:

 

Lockwood, S. J., Pawson, M.G. and Mumford, B.C., 1977. "Effects of holding mackerel at different densities in nets of various sizes." M.A.F.F., Fish. Res. Tech. rep. No. 33, 10 pp

 

 

Pawson, M. G. and Lockwood, S. J., 1980. "Mortality of mackerel following physical stress, and its probable cause." I.C.E.S. rapp. proc. verb., 177: 439-443.

 

 

Holeton, G. F., M.G. Pawson & Shelton, G., 1982. "Gill ventilation, gas exchange and survival in the Atlantic mackerel (Scomber scombrus L.)." Can. J. Zool, 60: 1141-1147.

 

 

Lockwood, S. J., M. G. Pawson and D. Eaton., 1983. "The effects of crowding on mackerel (Scomber scombrus L) - physical condition and mortality". Fisheries Research, 2: 129-147.

 

 

So, when anglers have caught enough mackerel for a fry or for bait, they should stop fishing for them unless they are using barbless hooks and can return the fish to the water without touching them.

 

Mike P."

 

 

Tight Lines - leon