fish torturers....

[scalf]

/forums/images/icons/tongue.gif hey, recent study in great britain confirms fish do feel pain...fishermen should be ashamed and outlawwed...jmho..gl /forums/images/icons/crazy.gif /forums/images/icons/mad.gif /forums/images/icons/club.gif

[Mark Heide]

scalf,

Fish taste good!!! I'll kill them as fast as possible so they will not suffer.

Mark

[HDPM]

Actually I think a reasonable argument can be made against catch and release fishing - even before that particular study. I have done catch and release, but I think eating what you catch is better. I use animals and am willing to kill them for my benefit. But catch and release inflicts pain for our entertainment, which offers less justification than killing them for food. But I have caught and released and don't carry a lot of guilt around. PETA might equate me w/ a baby killer or something tho. Banning catch and release fishing would drastically curtail fishing though. Either because the limits would be so low that people could not fish a lot of places, or all the fish would be taken and there wouldn't be any. And I am not going to try to ban Ed I, z, Boris, M2d and others. So I won't be protesting with the PETA crowd, but I don't know that I will do catch and release fishing. (I was thinking along these lines before the study) And this is even though I pose very little danger to the fish given how lousy I am at fishing.

[Ray Zee]

how many poor frogs and mice have you cut open you torturer. you and your profession have inflicted much pain on all the animals of the world for your experiments. dont ever go to the zoo as the monkeys will throw their turds at you.

[Ed I]

Yes I do pull fish around by their lips for my own entertainment. I do release my catch and try to minimize their suffering by using barbless hooks. Sometimes you can release a fish and 20 min later it will resume feeding.

[Ed I]

I do carry some guilt around. I've released many fish over the past 25 yrs. Its good that I don't know what the mortality rate is. There is some mortality associated with catch and release but certainly not as much as if we kept all that we caught.

Are you going to fish this year?

[Glenn]

I have read that trout mortality can be pretty high during hot months when the fish are under a lot of stress (maybe 10%) but proper handling cuts down on this enormously. Other species are much more resilient. They did a study during a bass tournament once where over 300 bass were weighed in, tagged and released after being kept in livewells all day. Only 6 died over the next month or so which was not much more than the normal expected mortality. (note, this may be slightly off as I saw it a few year ago--but the gist is right) Do they feel pain? Maybe. Considering that--especially here is New Jersey--the only reason these fish have clean and healthly places to live is because of anglers, I have a hard time feeling bad about it. And HDPM, eating fish in NJ often isn't a good idea unless you are in some sort of a biggest tumor contest.

[Cyrus]

"Recent study in Great Britain confirms fish do feel pain."

How do you respond to that ?

Ari Fleischer : "It is no longer possible to deal peacefully with the fish issue. We have gone the extra diplomatic mile. Now we will rip their lips apart!"

Baghdad Bob: "The salmons attacked us. And then they committed suicide."

Donald Rumsfeld: "Some of you have reported that fish do not like pain. I think this is just one side of the story. There is another side of that story than the other side and that is the side that I have from others and which is the side I'm not with familiar to I'm sure and I can assure you [raises hands with palms open] that fish actually enjoy pain."

Alan Greenspan: "It's a question of fine tuning pain. Our aim is to keep adjusting the pain every week until the fish no longer feel the difference."

John Cole: "Yeah, catch and release and pain in the lips. Just like my morning classes."

[scalf]

/forums/images/icons/tongue.gif gr8 post..lol....

/forums/images/icons/blush.gif i finally figgered out the underlying psychological benefit of fly fishing...these individuals were wicked slaveholders who got their jollies whipping the slaves, and have now reincarnated, needing to stand waist high in cold water to prevent prematur orgasm, while flailing away, in an attempt to whip fish (slave), but when frustrated and not successfull, need to hook their sensitive mouths and rip flesh from them in agony...oh, well...each to his own....we still have cock-fighting here in south carolina, which probably is more humane than fishing...oughta use nets...gl /forums/images/icons/crazy.gif /forums/images/icons/ooo.gif /forums/images/icons/club.gif

[HDPM]

No, I don't think I will fish this year. Combination of factors.

[Zeno]

I have fished since I was about 7 years old. I have not and will never feel guilty about it, from catch and eat (my preference) to catch and release (usually because by gaming rules). And there is no rational reason why I should. And certainly not because of reasons put out by pressure groups with the combined intelligence of a mollusk.

/forums/images/icons/cool.gif Le Misanthrope /forums/images/icons/smirk.gif

[Homer]

I have not and will never feel guilty about it......And there is no rational reason why I should.

Sure there is. You are causing an animal pain for your own pleasure. It's one thing if you are going to eat it, but it's another if you are going to throw it back.

I feel the same way about hunting. If you kill an animal then you better damn well eat it.

-- Homer

[patrick dicaprio]

i am sure Bill Clinton is somewhere, cigar in hand and intern under the desk, telling the fish "I feel your pain."

Pat

[M2d]

I think that the mortality rate of my released fish is probably much lower than the norm. I'm not saying that I'm a super biologist. I have a self imposed policy that, if a fish I catch isn't going to make it (or doesn't seem like it will), then it goes home with me. period. I also have a self imposed no-fish-in-the-freezer policy, so I make sure that the fish is eaten fresh and not wasted.
I doubt very much that all the fish I release make it, but I make damn sure that the fish I release have a decent chance of it. It eats me up to no end when I see some orvis clone spend ten minutes fighting (in current, no less) a medium sized trout, then release it, wobbily) back into the current, and then have the gall to preach C&R and pat himself on the back. The idiot doesn't even realize that the fish he released back into the water has as much chance of surviving there as I do.

My basic belief on fishing is that I respect the fish and the water. I also believe that, if someone is not prepared to ensure that these resources are not wasted, then he or she does not belong there. releasing a fish that will surely die of lactic acidosis, or carelessly handling the fish so that it's release harms it more than helps it is certainly wasting a resource.

The largest trout i caught out of Putah Creek went home with me.
She was a 24" brown, and fell to a #20 black AP nymph that was smaller than her teeth. Given the size tippet that I needed to fish that small a fly (7X), the total fight time was in the 15 minute range (add in heavy current, and a downstream hookup to see why it took so long). As I got her to net, I realized that there was, maybe, a 20% chance of her making it, if I made a perfect release. Maybe less. She was a little battered from rocks during the fight and breathing very heavily.
I do regret having to whack her over the head, because I think it's a shame that she wasn't in the stream anymore. However, I think it would have been a far greater shame if she was floating downstream later that day. While I regret having to do the action, I've never regretted performing the action.

[M2d]

mmmm. mollusks taste gooooood!!
C&R clamming?

[BruceZ]

I feel the same way about hunting. If you kill an animal then you better damn well eat it.

Hunting keeps animal populations in balance whether they are eaten or not. It is beneficial to animal populations overall when done in a regulated manner. Without hunting, excessive numbers of certain animals have led to animal starvation and other ecological problems. I'm not a hunter BTW.

As for fishing, even Jesus fished (supposedly).

[Ed I]

On many of Montanas heavily fished waters, quality fishing or viable populations could not be maintained without limited harvest or catch and release regulations. Most lakes in the state allow a reasonable harvest.

[Ed I]

It bugs me also to see someone overplay a fish, especially when they let the fish get way downstream.

I won't go below 5x even though I put down more fish. I still break off many.

[Ed I]

True, catching fish when water temps approach 70 does increase mortality. Proper handeling can mitigate this some. I try to find not to fish under these circumstances.

[M2d]

Now that they have big eyed hooks in small sizes, I don't tie on regular sized hooks anymore. now I can fish 18's on 5x. can't imagine what that does to the presentation, though, especially for nymphs

[John Cole]

I assiduously avoid morning classes.

[Cyrus]

Suggestions about being kind to fish and not inflicting pain to fish are doomed from the get go.

[Zeno]

I think it was implicit in my post that I follow all gaming rules about fishing but if someone does not see that, then to be explicit - I have always followed all fishing regulations. And I agree that catch and release rules have a benefit in keeping fish populations healthy for lakes and rivers, especially ones that are heavily used. But I find no reason to feel "guilty" for my fishing habits.

Others may have different opinions about this and that is fine, but that does not mean that I have to adhere to their opinions, beliefs, or interpretations of the natural world.

-Zeno

[Ed I]

My intent was not to suggest that you do not follow fishing regs. Did the tone of my post really lead you to believe that?

[Zeno]

"My intent was not to suggest that you do not follow fishing regs. Did the tone of my post really lead you to believe that? "

No it did not, Ed. I just wanted to make everything perfectly clear, as a former President use to say, so that there could be no misunderstandings or misinterpertations of my post.

-Zeno /forums/images/icons/smile.gif

[Graham]

It's dopey for anyone to ever have thought fish don't feel pain. Pain is your body's way of saying something's wrong. Fish have complex nervous systems and when their body says something's wrong (...like: Hey, there's a dirty big barbed metal hook through my chops), then that fish is going to experience pain.

btw, I'm just off spearfishing this morning. Trying to stick a sharp metal pole into the heads of a few nice snapper. I think these trout fishermen should be made to get in the water and go mano a fisho in the fish's environment, instead of cheating from the edge with a fishing line... /forums/images/icons/grin.gif

"Fishing is for men. Fishing rods ... are for sissies!"
Check out www.joecartoon.com/pages/catchnrelease/ (http://www.joecartoon.com/pages/catchnrelease/) - might have to go to cartoons and scroll through to the one called catch and release