Tips on bringing home wild fish

[badassissimo]

Fish caught on a line go through quite a struggle being caught, then are usually damaged to some extent and can be difficult to get home and acclimate. One other struggle is getting them off live food like they are used to. If you want to keep natives, id keep the hobbies seperate and try to locate your native fish by other means like online ordering or a local fish farm

+1

 

[divemaster99]

Fish don't necessarily take on bad health after being caught. Natives at least are very resilient, I've found this to be true multiple time some of which I released an LMB off a docks and it just swam around like normal (the water was very clear that day especially for Erie) then I watched it circle back around and I caught it again. So they are very hardy fish in general.

I do agree with using barbels hooks, make as little contact with scaled fish as possible, and quarantine if possible.

This is pretty funny that this thread just popped up when I'm prepping to go collect natives on Saturday

 

[Cod]

someone taking shots at our great lakes ^.^ i believe that natives can be hardier than CB fish IME, fish for a lot of what you're targeting, select the best lookin one with the least amount of injury from gettin hooked, and go with smaller/younger fish cuz they will acclimate to tank life better. also most WC natives will eat a day or two later after bein caught

 

[divemaster99]

^ Lol, Erie is my favorite place on earth (and I've been all over the place), I could never even think of intentionally harming it's ecosystem.

 

[Jag586]

Son and I went got 7 blue gill which are in my tank doing fine for 48 hours so far I was lucky all the hooks were in the lip, I did sharpen the hooks and used pliers to bend back the barb to reduce injury....

I did catch a bullhead catfish great looking guy he was 9 inches long and healthy the hook went a little far down so to reduce injury to the fish I took my time and he stung me or a fin cut me either way hurt like heck and I bled a lot I had to set the fish down to get a better grip but decided to let him go due to the stress of being in a bucked for 3 more hours I figured it was best to just let him go back home I'm still looking to get a bull head, I would love a couple sunfish (I know blue gill are a type of sunfish) and a cpl others but well see I'll keep you all posted and when my tanks said and done I'll post picks


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[Cod]

i get can get bullhead easy around me, only if i could catch some and give it to u =(

 

[Jag586]

What part of mi are you from cod maybe just point me in the right direction


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