"Doug Kanter" wrote in message
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"NOYB" wrote in message
news

"Doug Kanter" wrote in message
...
"NOYB" wrote in message
ink.net...

"Shortwave Sportfishing" wrote in message
news
as to catch/release, it is almost never done properly hook set and
retrieval is never done properly and while it sounds good c/r hurts
more fish than it saves.

Proper "Catch and release hurts more fish than it saves?" Are you sure
you phrased that correctly? Afterall, the vast majority of fish
caught and released live to be fooled again.

You should know better than to say something as statistically outrageous
as that. Let's focus on red snapper, for instance. What percentage of
them are tagged or marked in some way, so they can be identified later?

Go on floridasportsman.com fishing forums and send an IM to a member
named C. undecimalis (Alexis Trotter) if you think I'm wrong. She lives
in St. Pete, works for FWC, and studies mortality rates of c/r snook.

Here's what her study showed:


General Catch and Release Mortality:
Estimated at 2.13%.

It's an interesting study, but it only applies to snook placed in a
holding tank after being caught. How tough is a snook?

They're like a bass...on steroids. But they're actually pretty fragile.
You're supposed to handle them with wet hands...and never hold up the really
big ones with a lip-gripper. It's better to support the belly if you're
holding them up for a picture.

They're also extremely sensitive to cooler water temps. Anything below 57 F
is bad news for snook.




My only frame of reference would be fresh water fish at the moment. If I
release a weakened smallmouth bass in a lake where there are no pike
around, it's got a better chance of survival than if there ARE pike, which
will spot a crippled fish and turn it into dinner very quickly. If I
release a weakened pike (and it's pretty hard to do that to a pike), the
fish has sharp enough fins & gill covers that not much will attack it while
it's getting its wits about it again.

You can't point to one study and say it's conclusive about all fish.

No, you're correct. In fact, the chance of survival for a snook depends
greatly upon where you catch him. If you drag him out of the mangroves, or
out from under a dock, he'll probably live...since a snook's natural
predators (dolphin and sharks) can't get to him there. If you pull him away
from a bridge or wreck that flipper is feeding around, he's toast when you
throw him back in.