MAN, I'd like to be in on that fish fry!

8 fish limit/day/person, 14" minimum length ... ruh-ro!

Great catch!

What a haul.

I never heard of anybody who loved eating bass...

Whar u frum, Mars?

Must be... Even here in N. NV where we have few bass, a lot of people love to eat bass.

nuthin like a good piece o'bass in the mornin...

+1

agreed to that!

When we lived in Central Washington in the Heart of the Columbia Basin we would fish some of the potholes South of Moses Lake, it was a no brainier to bring home at least a burlap bag filled with either small mouth bass or brim in just a couple of hours fishing. We didn't need a boat we would do it from the bank. None of the fish went to waste either as we had regular stopping points where some of the old ladies begging us to leave the fish with them.

Besides, catchin 'em would be a lot more fun than haulin 'em around...

Forget PETA. There are some places where local bass anglers might string you up...

Our crowd was well within the limit. We were fishing with an ex game warden.

How so?



What's the problem? We ate a bunch, brought home a bunch, and will feed lots of friends and family. No problemo, in my book anyway. My "locals anglilng buddies" have been catching them like that since the early '70's. Don't seem to be any shortage of them, at least in the last 40 years.

Same around here. Muskie fishermen are worse though. I don't generally keep bass except for rock bass unless I'm camping; there are just better options here.

I see, this is not a catch n release thread .....

You want anger and outrage spend some time on the steelhead fishing boards...

Not hardly. I don't apologize for it either. We were more than legal, cleaned and ate/will eat every single one of them, brought a bunch back to the desert with me, and will enjoy them over the next 3-4 months. Some of you folks need to lighten up a bit.

Like politics, it's all local... there ARE places -- especially smaller lakes that get heavy tournament pressure -- where the catch-and-release ethic rules, and they'd happily hang people for killing largemouths. Obviously not the case there, but I know some people who would have a coronary merely by looking at that photo!

Do you know anything at all about Toledo Bend?

when famdamly comes up here fishin...I have to turn the fish lose myself .....they want to keep any and everything...rite to the limit. I always ask why?....cause their is so many and there big!!! I always say "THEY GOT THAT WAY, CAUSE I PUT THEM BACK"...18 to 20+inch graying and 44-48"+ pike all day long...u will stop fishing cause u are tired. btw I was guilty as a youg man-back in the states lol....not givin u a hard time just thinking out loud

Most bass anglers are hardcore "catch and release" fanatics.

Not me though, my dad used to own a 10 acre pond that was bass heavy and we always had a hard time getting people to actual harvest largemouth when they were out fishing. It got to the point where I had to start donating LMB to our local raptor recovery center to get better growth rates for the LMB in his pond. The last four years that he owned it I had our local Game and Parks biologists come out and electroshock and remove 150 LMB a year to stock in public lakes. Harvest helps when done right and the most common size of fish are thinned down. I do like to see BIG fish thrown back just simply because they are so rare.

Don't get your hackles up. I was commenting on the effect the photo would have in those places where catch-and-release bass fishing is a religion. Some of those people would stroke out.

Both Texas Parks and Wildlife and Lousiana Department of Wildlife and Fisheries have tried to get people to actually take bass home iwth them in the past to have the harvest spread out over a wider age range. I would say probably 95% or more bass caught on T-Bend are catch and release.

In areas where it's a problem or they want to manage entirely for trophy fish they can institute a slot. The drawback to a slot is you cut off the top tier of tournaments that don't fish slot lakes and those are a huge money maker.

good catch anyway...better hope some native tribe that "use to" fish with dine-o-mite ...don't come along and toss u boys off the lake and get "there own season"........

We didn't keep any of the bigger females. No offense to you NE, but I'm not too terribly worried about any bass tournament fisherman, don't care.

Hey Kentucky, no problem, and no hackle problem here. I just find it entertaining when people comment and whine about something they are totally clueless about. Toledo Bend ain't some freakin' farm pond. It's like 80 miles long and 180,000 acres of bass fishing paradise. You can't even get to 75% of the fish on that lake......too much cover, salvinia (sp?) etc. Like I said, been catching them like that there for 40 years. I think my local buddies understand the program pretty well by now.

I figured guys around here would enjoy a pretty cool picture of some spring time fun. I'm quite surprised at the bawlin' and squawlin' going on here.

Whoa, that is a mess of fish!

I do Sunday morning sunrise service at lakes all the time and the photo does not bother me, I do know people that it would bother. In Texas those fish have realtively fast growth rates and can withstand harvest pressures better than they do up north where the growth rates are much slower. Your average 16" LMB in Nebraska is four years old, I am guessing at Toledo Bend it is closer to half that due to the longer growing season.

Largemouth do taste a lot like crappie.

Yeah, but it would be entertaining to walk around the crowd with a hidden camera at, say, the U.S. Open, and show that photo off. That would be You Tube worthy...

Back before bass tournaments when there use to be a lot of big bass. 10 & 12 lber's was no big deal.

Nice!

But....you guys eat those?

Y'all have to come north for a bluegill/crappie or a walleye fish fry. You'll never keep another bass.

All joking aside, hell of a couple days fishin there.

NIce catch. Seems to me that fish are there for eatin' not winning contests! Enjoy them.

I don't care for the taste of bass, but I would keep those too. T-Bend is not a typical bass lake. Any legal fish caught, spawn or not, less that 5-6lbs needs to be fileted.

I used to do that too, decades ago. Then I saw picts of a post tournament at Toledo Bend with dumpsters full of dead fish boling in the sun supposedly on their way to the poor.

I haven't deliberately killed a bass in ten years or so and I now return them to the beds. I never swung them onto the boat floor and then over the side while culling the "livewell" either.

BASS competitive fishing mentality has changed bass fishing to what lawyering is to justice. Add $ to the 'sport' and watch it go sour.

1B

Tournaments (on T-Bend and Rayburn) require that fish be released alive. Dead fish are penalized heavily.

Don't worry, Johnny. I am here to help!

I bet you turned the big ones back though.

+1

knock yourself out if you like, but I'd enjoy the fishing and trim the keep down a bit. To each his own.

Nice take, but nothing big there. Me and my 4 and 6 year olds have had weekends like that. We throw them back and eat one or 2.

Great fun though.

Makes more sense now.

+1

True, that is a good point. It really is a local thing, specific to the lake you are fishing.

Always thought it odd the mindset that it's OK to punch holes in a fish just so you can bang him around in a live well for a while, half anesthetize them to keep them from floppin around on the scale, then "set them FREEeeeeeeeee". Free to go back to the bottom and heal up, then do it all over when the next Bass Star Wannnabe comes along in a $50,000 boat he can't afford but really needs so he can tourny fish. I've caught the released fish before with half a jaw gone, an eye out, or maybe just the lip skin ripped. Hell-of-a-gentle sport, Sport.

Fish are made to eat not play with. If you want to play with something cut a hole in your pants pocket or take up golf. When I release a bass, it's just before my fingers touch the hot grease. And with no apologies. I couldn't possibly care less if that 4 pounder I ate kept Bubba from placing in the local Krispy Kreme Friday Night Bass Tournament.

T-Bend is not one of the premier bass lakes in the world because it's managed poorly. The size and bag limits are there for a reason. There are never enough bass kept from the lake, but we like to let the big ones survive. Sound familiar?

Toledo Bend has been like that as long as I can remember and I am 62

Man there a local of "arm chair Quarterbacks" on the board.... I love to eat bass... I would have done the dame thing.... Good for the catchers, I wish I could have joined you....

the rest of you, remember what your mama use to say... if you do not have anything positive to say, keep your mouth shut. Let the professionals manage the lake (game management)... not the so called Weekend warrior bass fisherman

That's awesome RickB!!!! I've got your back, too. Well done buddy! I don't have the heart to tell some of these numbskulls that the vast majority of those fish pictured are 2-4lb male fish.........and I won't bother posting a pic of day #2 with 30 bass and 40'ish white perch.

Nice catch. Bass are good eatin too!

Well local conditions apply. That's Mexico. . And I didn't shoot all those birds myself. And every one was eaten, fresh, not frozen.

They are NOT running out of them, I can promise you.

I don't suspect you'll be running out of largemouth anytime soon, either. You gotta stop shootin' all the dinks though. :0

The only thing wrong with the fish picture is, I'm not in it. The only thing wrong with the pheasant picture is, me and my dogs aren't in it. Also, some of the fish should be saved for a deer camp fish fry. Especially since I would be in driving distance. I would share in the shame and help destroy evidence.

They have reduced the limit a good bit over the years and upped the minimum length. Back in the 60's and 70's you literally could catch a boat load of fish and keep them and lots of people did, the lake was still relatively young and booming. I'm many of you have seen the old pics in the marinas around Rayburn and T-Bend of 100+ bass stringers day after day.

You do catch bigger fish with more regularity now than you did 30-45 years ago.

I don't get a great thrill playing with fish. I do like to catch fish; and I DO like to eat fish.

I'll always be of the mind that people who play with fish are somewhat elitist, and many don't like eating them. To each their own. Just don't make my favorite fishing holes for the last 55 years catch-&-release, so you can come and play with fish.

I'm glad to see some are as me. Those spring caught, cold weather bass wil taste great.

I bought a launch ticket at OH Ivie a few years ago and asked the lady what the limit was and she was aghast as she asked me if I really kept any bass.

I fish with a friend who eats some also, and I guess he fishes with me because of the fear of fishing with some of his other friends and their animosity toward anyone who would keep a bass.

Once many years ago on Fayette lake out of LaGrange I put the blade to an eight pounder on the boat ramp one night as I was talking to a member of the Austin bass club, who was there for a tournament. I was camping there that weekend and wanted fresh fish. His voice quavered as he said he had never caught a fish that big and I looked up to see a few tears rolling down each cheek. Freaking unreal, but now I turn the big ones back. The meat is too grainy anyway.

Back in the day, 100+ fish was the norm, this time of year on Toledo Bend. My FIL has two pics taken the same day. One taken at lunch, a 6' stringer of bass that he cant hold up, caught by himself that morning. The other pic is a duplicate caught that afternoon. Another 6' stringer!

sailfish is pretty good eating.

Roger. When are we going, Roger?

They sure are........my son's shown here !