Crappie survival when fishing deep

[waterbound]

From the sounds of the report posted a significant number of fish caught from depths will die even if released, but not all of them. Some are probably just a little tougher than others and are able to survive better.

[Chris Haley]

I see what you guy's are saying. However, if you release 15 crappies and 10 die, then you continue until you have a limit of keepers. Then you are responsible for the death of 20 crappie. Is that acceptable? That sounds like to me that you are responsible for 200% dead crappie.

[slurpie]

After reading most of that article. Crappie are the worst at 77% mortality rate. It does come down to personal opinion on what to do. I personally keep smaller fish that i normally would not, because i feel they are dead anyways. It sucks cleaning an 7" crappie when there is 10" plus down there but some days those little guys are really aggressive. Some days 2 to 1 its a bad day but i'm not letting them go because they would die anyways. So we pack up and go try somewhere else. So we dont keep all the little ones. But it all comes down to personal choice. But it is really sad to throw dead fish back.

[goblueM]

that's the thing fellas - a lot of times you release the fish and they swim away, but they are mortally wounded.

just like letting a fish go with a hook in its gut - sure it looks normal but mortality studies show they die pretty quick

[deadeye]

The places I fish I would be done fishing in 10-15 minutes if I kept everything I caught. Even if some of them die at least they are still in the ecosystem instead of my frying pan. There are plenty of northerns down there that are happy to gulp them up.

Its really odd to me that guys get criticized for keeping fish but then they get criticized for letting them go . Until a study is actually done on ice fishing mortality rates for crappies (both being handled poorly and handled well) I'm going to respectfully agree to disagree and let my fish go.

[Chris Haley]

How many dead crappies do you think are actually eaten by other fish? Releasing too many crappies will flood the ecosystem with more dead crappies than will be consumed!! The rest will just lay on the bottom and rot.(Wanton Waste) Those few that float up and freeze to the ice may be eaten by eagles and such in the spring. But how many will this actually happen to? I don't know how so many people want to totally disregard the facts? Studies have been done. More released crappies die than survive! One wounded deer that wonders off and dies without being found WILL surely be consumed by birds predators and such, and the bones will feed countless mice. So yes, in that situation the food for other animals applies. Water systems are different. Think about drowning victims for a moment. After only a week under water they are already decomposing. Fish are no different. Once the decomposition starts, I do not think that very many fish would be interested. Crayfish would love this, but how many inhabit the area all theses crappies are dying. How long would it take for a crayfish to consume one crappie? I'm sorry but with the popularity of crappie fishing and the plain old fact that most crappies under the ice are deep, you can not come up with a valid reason to release deep water crappie.

[TylerS]

Here's a question that got me thinking: What happens on a crappie slot lake like Lida in Ottertail county where every fish under 11 inches has to be released? Do fisherman stick to the 20 FOW range to be safe? What happens when the crappies move out to 30+ FOW and the fishermen follow? If you were an honest man and called a CO after you caught a couple under the slot that died, would they write you a ticket or tell you to move to shallower water?

[Chris Haley]

That is a VERY good question!!! That however is our ALL KNOWING DNR! It is something that needs to be addressed. The slot is there to protect smaller fish from harvest. Obviously the mortality rate was NEVER considered when the powers to be made the slot. The thing about the DNR law makers, they tend to think with one brain and that brain is going off practices from many years ago. It takes a lot of people questioning them to consider change. Remember they ARE a government agency.

[goblueM]

now i disagree there chris. limits are set for lakes after careful research

limits are also set with the expectation that not everybody goes out and catches a limit every time, much less keeps one. Simply adding on the 11 inch has been proven to increase size structure

there are actually studies that examine this, and they are thought through, despite what you might think

[TylerS]

now i disagree there chris. limits are set for lakes after careful research

limits are also set with the expectation that not everybody goes out and catches a limit every time, much less keeps one. Simply adding on the 11 inch has been proven to increase size structure

there are actually studies that examine this, and they are thought through, despite what you might think

I'm not agreeing or disagreeing with you, but did the DNR take into consideration deep-water mortality rate when making the slot? If it was to improve the average size of the fish, what happens during deep-water season when (as the one study suggests) more than 75 percent of crappies released will die? Those 75 percent are the ones that are short of the slot and are meant to grow in later years. Sooo...later on down the road there might be some large crappies in Lida, but entire year classes of fish could be wiped out due to the mortality rate of fishing deep.

Just food for thought. I'm not trying to start an argument, I'm just honestly curious because, on paper, the slot seems like a good idea, but in reality its almost counterproductive...

Opinions anyone?

[Chris Haley]

You're right. Lets not let this get out of hand so that it goes away. This has become a very good discussion. It would be sad if it goes away.

[deadeye]

Just food for thought. I'm not trying to start an argument, I'm just honestly curious because, on paper, the slot seems like a good idea, but in reality its almost counterproductive...

Opinions anyone?

I have fished slot lakes and it is productive. The fish are bigger and there are more of them than in similar lakes without it. So IDK if thats a opinion but its what has happened for me.

Back to the whole crappie thing, the study that was listed was done to give a stat about fizzing, not simple release. I also don't see any methods of capture listed, average length of ascent, length of time in out of water, actual depth, method of observation during release, lake conditions, ect. It was not actually done for this topic. So I don't see how that really can be counted for this. If it was of that much concern to the DNR they would study it. I know people think they are a bunch of dunces there but in reality the people that come up with the studies and tests at least have masters in fisheries and biology. They know a lot more about the fish's anatomy than you and I.

Now, I am all for a proper study on this. The more we know the more the better we can manage the resource.

[DaSwede]

Just for the sake of discussion, I'm going to pose this question. Why fish then? If I'm in water over 20ft because that's where the fish are, but I can't catch them for fear that I'm going to kill 75% of the ones that I do catch, why even fish? Sure I can sit in 10ft of water all day, but if that's not where the fish are, then I don't get it? Trust me, I don't want to kill fish unless I'm going to eat them. But from what I'm reading, even if I'm careful, I'm going to kill fish. Should we rope off all water that's over 20 ft deep?

I know I can keep every fish that I catch, unless there's a slot, but I've been catching some VERY small crappies this year. That doesn't seem right to me either.

Quite the conundrum, eh?

[Wimbie]

I think they say over 20'. I saw Babe Winkleman icefishing for Crappies and was using some needle thing through a scale to relieve the air bladder. Don't know if that works or not. Filleting them seems to work wonders though.

[slurpie]

Yeah it sucks keeping little fish, but either you keep them or they die anyways. And the predatory fish can only eat so many. If a hot bite is going on and everyone throws some back thats alot of fish. I'm not saying you should'nt fish deep. But if you know they are dead why put them back. either keep them or move to a diffrent spot.

[Big Buck Buster]

I second the 20ft rule! I would also say that 30+ is keep no matter what depth. Now if you google "Diving Decompression Table" You will see that a diver that dives to a depth of 40ft and stays down for 300 mins, requires an accent time of 19:40 mins. Crappies that are at those depths have been there for much longer and have much smaller bodies obviously. So all of you say you just reel them in slower I wager to guess that you are not reeling them in over 20 mins per fish. How can you say a crappie is going to live.

Now before someone jumps on their soap box, I realize that fish and humans are different. However, fish are not immune to the effects of decompressing to fast. So even if we cut the times by 75% it is still 5 mins. How many "slow reelers" even take that much time?

As a Diver, I couldn't help but laugh at this statement. I am not making fun of it in any way. I just pictured in my head, a fish making a deco stop.

To me, I would think that the fish is suffering from and Air Embolism, and not Decompression sickness. If you think about it, it is the air sack that is expanding at a fast rate when reeling up. The air in the sack expands so fast that it eventually pops out of the fish's mouth. Just like a divers BC controlling the divers buoyancy, the sack controls the buoyancy of the fish. If the fish can't release the air from the sack fast enough, where is it going to go? Out the mouth. Just a thought.

[Chris Haley]

Not being a diver I didn't know the proper condition. Whatever it's called the crappie still dies.

[JP Z]

Now I was fishing yesterday in 28' of water and most of the crappies I caught would just shoot back down the hole, where as others took a little coaxing. But none of these fish had the airbladder sticking out Or I would have kept them on the spot, even the 5inchers. So are you saying that all these fish died on me even though they all swam fine and didn't have the telltall bladder mouth? Of course I was just fishing for fun and didn't want to kill any fish........wooops.

[New2TheFly]

If the DNR thought this was a substancial issue they most likely would have implemented a plan to relieve the problem. Chris - You seem to be quite opinionated on this topic.

All you guys fishing for fun better stop, apparently you're wasting more fish than those poachers.

I would tend to agree that pulling fish from these depths can have an impact on their survival. However, if people are gladly following the rules you have no right to badger them. I am not breaking any laws by throwing back a 6" crappie that appears to be healthy, so don't knock me for doing it.

[Tully]

I was thinking about this last year when we were up at the Angle. We got on some BIG crappies up in Ontario. We were fishing in about 40 ft. We were trying to reel them slow but the bladder was still in a lot of their mouths. We were keeping them but then I was worried someone would "B" that we were keeping 14 - 15+" crappies. Heading up on the 5th and planning on getting some of those slabs again this year.

Tully

[jimmyjames76]

Have you guys ever seen masses of dead crappies on the bottom or just under the ice on your under water cameras? I don't doubt that some fish die, but on some of these crowded metro lakes it seems like if 50+% were dying people would see them on their cameras all the time. I don't use a camera that often, but even fishing in or near the shanty towns I don't think I've ever seen a dead fish on the bottom or just under the ice. I know for a fact I've never seen lots of dead fish. Maybe regular camera users could comment?