Lessons learned

Copyright © 2005 Blethen Maine Newspapers Inc.

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Last week, two things happened which will forever change the way I fish.

First, I caught a tagged striper.

The fish bore a small, yellow tag, encrusted with algae. I chiseled it off with my thumbnail, revealing the location the striper was originally tagged: Seaside Park, New Jersey, hundreds of miles south of Maine, as the fish swims.

Striped bass tagging programs have gone on for nearly a century, part of our never-ending quest to better understand how these fish make it from their spawning and wintering grounds in the Chesapeake Bay, in Virginia and Maryland, to their summer haunts in New England and southeastern Canada, almost 1,000 miles north.

As with the Arctic tern, which travels from one pole to the other, and monarch butterflies, which cover thousands of miles each year in flights to the mountains of Mexico, the simple act of migration is impressive and awe-inspiring.

But that alone wasn't enough to change my fishing.

Three days later, I killed a striped bass -- unintentionally. Now don't get me wrong, I occasionally keep fish to eat -- trout, perch, cusk and bluefish are among my favorites -- but this one was different. I released it afterwards.

Here's the story: I was fishing with a friend. He hooked and landed a nice 34-inch striped bass on a three-inch Wildeye Shad that I had given him -- a small, rubber lure with amazing, life-like detail and action. I had neglected to pinch the barb. In Maine, a legal striped bass must fall between 20 and 26 inches in length, or must exceed 40 inches. This bass fell short. We shook the barbed hook free with pliers, and the fish began to bleed from the gills.

By law, I had to release it, but I knew it would die.

Biologists call this a hooking mortality. It's a topic that's been discussed among fishermen for years.

Opinions -- scientific and otherwise -- differ on the survival rates of released fish. A recent study in the North American Journal of Fisheries Management concluded that hooking mortality of trout ranges from as low as 3.8% on fly-caught fish, to 31.4% on bait-caught fish.

In state and federal management plans for striped bass, a constant 8% release mortality rate is assumed when setting seasons and limits.

Release mortality is a reality that all fishermen face, because, whether we prefer to or not, we all have to release fish on occasion.

A fish might be too short, or too long, or may put an angler over a daily creel or possession limit. Or perhaps you don't eat fish, or prefer not to kill them for any reason.

Regardless, one fact remains true: the fewer fish we kill upon release, the more there will be for everyone to enjoy later on.

It's also a matter of respect for the fish you pursue. Stripers provide hundreds of thousands of Mainers (315,600 anglers in 2003) with a free, exciting sport to take part in every spring, summer and fall.

If we all make an effort to handle our fish more carefully, that many more will return for everyone to enjoy next year.

And they will return, if we let them.

According to the National Marine Fisheries Service, many striped bass revisit the same locations, year after year. One angler I know tells the story of a man on Long Island who caught the same striped bass, identified by a tag, behind the same rock, for three consecutive years.

They were practically friends by that point.

When you consider that the 34-inch fish that we caught last week likely survived 10 years of migration through gillnets in the Chesapeake Bay and escaped the assault of thousands of lures, flies and bait from millions of anglers from Virginia to Maine, you begin to understand what a valuable resource we have -- and how important it is to protect it.

As fishermen, we will always have to deal with hooking mortality. Sometimes, things happen out of our control while playing a fish lead to its unintentional death. It happened to my friend and I last week.

That doesn't mean we should stop fishing, for the same reasons that a golfer who tees off on 100 acres of fertilized lawn shouldn't quit golf.

Everything we do in today's world in some way affects the environment. Our responsiblity is to minimize our impact.

Next time you catch a striper, or a wild trout or salmon or shad, consider where it came from.

I'd heard about the proper methods for releasing fish before.

Now it's time I started to listen.

The tagged striper -- a fish that had navigated 600 miles of unfriendly ocean to reach my cove in Maine -- proved that to me.

TIPS FOR RELEASING FISH ALIVE

1) If you use bait, use circle hooks. There's no excuse not to: they're just as effective, and they hook fish in the lip, not the gut. They're widely available in all sizes at local tackle shops. For more information on circle hooks, contact the Coastal Conservation Association at 846-1015.
2) Crimp Your Barb. A barbless hook makes it easy to release a fish.
3) Use a rod and line that will allow you to fight the fish quickly. The longer you play a fish, the more likely it will die of exhaustion: a common cause of death in fish — even if they swim off alive.
4) Don't touch a fish's body or gills. Lip a striped bass with your thumb or use forceps to remove a hook from a trout in the water. If you must touch a fish's skin, do so with wet hands or gloves. Remember, a fish's skin is its protection from disease.
5) Revive your fish. When you do so, be sure that their mouth is open, and that water is running ONLY through their mouth and out their gills. Don't move them tail first, or back and forth through the water. Try to simulate their natural swimming movement as best as possible.
6) Limit a fish's time out of the water. Preferably, don't take it out of the water at all. If you must, don't keep it out longer than you could hold your breath — and never let if flop around on the deck of a boat.
7) Don't fish in places where fish are abnormally stressed. During periods of low warm water, fish are particularly stressed, and much more likely to die of exhaustion after a fight.

Information courtesy Dr. Russ Danner, State of Maine Fish Pathologist

Dave Sherwood -- 621-5648

dsherwood@centralmaine.com