Home Forums Fishing Freshwater Catch and Release or Catch and Eat?

How do you guy's determine what you keep and what you don't? In another thread folks were saying they don't like to freeze fish. I freeze fish all the while in a vacumn sealer and they stay good for quite some time.

you can give a man a fish and feed him for a day...
You teach a man to fish,feed him for life...

I keep enough for a meal. If I freeze its to easy to get lost in the freezer. So only fresh now.

A couple of times a year I'll keep enough for dinner the same night. Anything that's deep hooked and doesn't look like it'll live also goes on the table. We don't have a big freezer or vacuum sealer.

I really don't like to freeze feesh,though many come in sizes you cain't eat before it slips.

I bet my bonk/release ratio is better than 100:1................

I fish for mainly sport,catch and release most always where we go,as we don't have the fine water round here like many of you have in your backyards..[Stick] If I want to eat fish one of my favorites is grilled cod with drawn butter

I'd much rather knock stuff in the head,because it's a whole lot faster/easier,than being nice to schit and very much hurts production.

Because I like my feesh fresh,I bonk in accordance to dinner time.............

I'm not much of a fish eater, but thats pretty well what happens when its time...

Dinner....

Happiness is snaking fillets offa still writhing Sockeye and tossing same on a grill over an open campfire...with but a leetle salt/pepper and butter.

Eating like a Pig,betwixt casts..................(grin)

Pretty much the same here, with littler feeshes...

those little dudes either get released into a pan of hot butter and a bit of season salt, or wrapped in foil with S&P onions and butter and tossed on the grill/fire..

Ingwewife likes Brookies...

Then there was this one time at Fish Camp when a pard and I bonked a few Sockeyes and destined them for the grill...



See...you aren't the only one who can get the sun to shine in AK...

You fished with Capt. Sobel?

I'm not the best fisherman but love fresh fish whether panfish, 'eyes (which I'm best at) bass, northerns too. I'll keep my limit if I get there with the exception of big brood fish northerns and bass which I'll release.

my preference for eating is walleye and sauger mainly cause the wife beotches if i keep snot rockets though ive cooked it a few times where she couldnt tell the difference, all else is usually turned loose......with 'eyes what i keep depends on what i catch, if the fishing is good we always toss back the big females and keep those between about a pound and a half an 5 pounds, if i havent caught chit all day ill throw a 9 pounder on the grill

Trout come home, as long as they're legal, in abundance. Freezer stays full of em.

Cats come home. They're filleted and froze.

Walleye and pike are kept when I'm lucky enough to catch em. Knife, then straight to the pan or grill.

Small and largemouth go back in.

If I get a craving for bluegill or crappie I'll go catch a load and cook em up, but rarely ever have them stored.

As a guy around hers says . . .

There is catch and release and there is catch and grease.


I personally believe is up to the person doing the fishing to determine as long as the requirements of the law is met. Where I fish I don't catch enough of the fish I eat to bother so I throw everything back.

NOW, if I were to stumble in to a bunch or bluegills or such. or catfish then things would be different.

I look at the life cycle of the fish.....if it's Pacific Salmon, that mature and die in 4-5 years, I put a few in the freezer.....if it's lake trout that grow at 1/2" per year, I only keep a small one for shore lunch and never take any home and all that old brood stock is returned to the lake.

Typically, I always let trout go.....although it depends on the stream, trip, where I am and if I have dinner plans. Every Laker caught goes in the freezer for fish tacos....and we can catch those by the truckload.

Reds get filleted on the half-shell and grilled. Steelies and Bass all go back

Ingwe, you need a stick to put those brookies on!

We always throw all our lakers back, how do you make the tacos?

I crappie fish all spring eat all winter