Your thoughts on eating LMB

[senkoskipper]

So how do you guys feel about eating bass or people that keep bass? Im fine with it i guess since fish are for eating and all that but dang, when i see someone keep any bass i get bummed out. I think to myself how manytimes i could have caught that bass or how big it could have been. But i guess i feel that way cuz im a bass fisherman.

[Mark Christianson]

EWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWw

YUK!

I'd much rather eat those bottom feeding things called walleyes.

[Muddog]

What do you mean? You can eat them? Warm water + Fish = (I don't want to think about it).

[HawgMan]

My "EX" wife fried up a Bass,Once!

I'm not gonna miss her! LOL

[Captain B.R.K]

It really is to bad that people take bass and fry em'up. I look at bass fishing the same way I look at Muskie, Big Pike and Smallmouth Bass fishing. I feel those fish are for the "sport" of fishing and they give back to us each time we fishermen are on the water. PLUS those 3 species, including LM Bass, take many years to go big in our MN waters. Granted, the growth rate is the same for any fish, but the DNR stocks many lakes with walleyes for us to enjoy the "put and take" fisheries.

I too get upset when real nice "sport" fish are taken out of lakes just for the purpose to put a meal on the table.....you can do that with a bucket full of panfish too!

[Juice]

Them Bass are some good things! Along with them loons and runned over skunks. Better if you let them bake in da the sun and eat them like jerky! J/K! On a more serious note. Bass arent too bad if there in that 1-2lb range and if there caught in cold water. They arent too bad then, but normally i dont eat bass since i can catch sunnies or crappies for a meal. I mostly like to C & R bass. But theres nothng wrong with them. Its not like you're going to turn green and fall over dead. Unless you catch them on my lake since they're "poisonous"

[Slyster]

We will keep a 1 or 2 Bass a summer.. fried up in Cajun Shorelunch they are actually VERY tasty. I prefer Northern... although we keep only a few of those too. So all in all.. of hundreds and hundreds of fish.. we might keep 4 ot 6 in one year. (Only 2 this summer so far)

I too think fishing has become more of a sport and not a way of feeding the family. In fact.. kids should NOT even eat ANY minnesota fish more than 1x per month anyway.

[freebledsoe]

Nothin wrong with eating a bass, they are tasty out of cold water. Not so tasty out of warm water, and with the high water temps right now don't even try them... Yuk.

Yes, walleyes are stocked. Because they have to be due to low/no reproduction on most lakes. Bass are not stocked because they successfully spawn in our lakes without any intervention from the DNR. I personally don't like the direction of the elitist attitude of alot of fishermen these days. As long as a fish kept is legal, and selective harvest is used, go for it.

Not trying to upset anyone, but you hear alot of guys on this site complaining about people keeping legal fish, especially bass. I personally think the attitude of bass fishermen has been influenced greatly by the fishing shows and multitude of large and small tournaments. Why is it more important for you to be able to catch huge bass to try to win a local tourney, than it is for a guy/ gal/ kid to be able to take home and eat their catch? I say it isn't.

[Mark Christianson]

Let me just add that I could care less.

Really. Just having a little fun.

Our bass populations are the least bit "in trouble".

I don't eat bass because if I want fish to eat I prefer walleye, panfish and catfish.

[Bobby Bass]

Cold water bass is very fine table fare. More then one fishing trip to the BWCA has had a shore lunch of SM included. Enough said. I will not get in to a debate here about select harvesting which from past comments is not accepted on this forum.

[Willy]

I wouldn't eat bass, but if someone wants to that's fine as long as they practice selective harvest and all that happy horseshoot.

Bass are abundant, but the big ones should be let go just like any other fish.

[Tyler Holm]

I've fished areas where all you catch is silver bass. I'm talking about every single cast. Hungry for a meal of fish, I've take a few limits (2-3) in my lifetime of those and fried them up fresh. It was a tasty treat.

I've never kept a LM or SM bass, and probably never will. I don't have a big problem with people keeping their legal limit of fish as long as your practicing selective harvest. I'd be a bit upset if I saw somebody keeping a stringer full of 4-6lb bass. If you want to keep the fish, let the bigger ones go and keep some smaller fish (1-2lbs) as they will taste much better on the tongue.

Think of the fun you had catching those nice LM & SM bass and if those fish are safely returned to the water, you and your kids can continue to enjoy catching those same fish later in life.

Yes, bass are abundent in MN, but not the real big ones. Let them go. CPR!!!

[bigdog]

They taste just fine to me and have eaten them for years although I prefer Northern. The small ones are not far from walleye.

[ozzie]

I will never eat bass again....unless I am in the bwca and the walleyes wont bite but even then i will be prepared and bring some soup or something!! I have tried it once or twice and that was once or twice to many!! But that is just me i am picky as for those that do all I can say is eat the smaller ones and take what you are going to eat and only what is going to be eaten... I hate when fish go to waste!!!

[Royce Aardahl]

My family and I ate lottsa fish till a few years back. I just don't like the mess in the kitchen any more. 2 meals a week back then is now 1 meal a month. LM and SM bass were in the fry pan once in a while and always tasted great. As I age and fish more often I have to release fish or the warden would be over. I'll most likely never fry up a smally again. I've always loved blue gills and northern. Mrs. prefers eyes and gills. Crappies are ok too. I still can't stand catfish.

[fishinchicks]

I prefer to eat salmon, and I wouldn't let my kids eat Minnesota caught fish anyway. I have a 14 yr old daughter with MS, so we have enough health problems in our house.

My opinion is to let the bigger fish go. In the area I live, there are not a lot of decent size LM to catch. We have only hooked tiny ones this year. On one lake where we like to go, there were many fish taken early in the season, and now nobody can seem to find any bigger than 9 inches.

[Lunker]

I prefer crappie, gills, small pike, an occasional walleye, perch, eelpout, bully. I never keep a trophy size of any fish, not even panfish. I don't keep bass, and I don't have a problem with those who keep a couple of small bass for a dinner. What I do have a problem with is when I see big fish being kept out of heavily pressured and city lakes, and stringers of big fish. I also have a problem with big stringers of eyes, pike, etc. I am in it for fun, and the occasional meal. I don't eat bass because I am mostly a bass fisherman, if I kept a few bass every time I went out, I'd keep a whole lot of fish. If I keep a couple of crappies or a small pike when i target them, i keep only a few meals a year because I don't fish for those species heavily. Fish are good eating, don't shy away from it, but be a guardian of the sport and it's resources. And call TIP if you see overharvesting! Good Eating!

[CrappieJohn]

As with all members of the carp family, you are better off eating suckers. lol

[Tyler Holm]

The one exception to not catching & releasing would be if you’re fishing a set line (or any line) and the fish completely swallows the hook. Some people have a hard time cutting their line and they just try to pry/tear the hook out. If for some reason or other a fish you caught is not going to survive and it is within the legal limits to keep…Keep it… Eat it… and Enjoy it. Don’t throw back a fish that will likely die. You caught it and if you’re responsible for its death, be a true sportsman and harvest that fish. Don’t let it go to waste.

If a fish does swallow the hook, or the hook gets caught heavily in the gills, there are practices that can be done to ensure the fish will live to tell about it. Those tactics have been detailed in another forum and are outside the scope of this one. Learn these hook removal tactics and/or don’t be above cutting your line to save a fish.

Fishing deep water fish is another time when one needs to be aware of what he/she is catching and know before hand what the consequences might be on the fish.

[SledNeck]

Maybe if I lived in a trailer,watched Nascar and listened to Toby Keith all day....then Id eat bass...and wash it down with some Milwaukees best.....being carefull not to spill any beer on my mullet.

[Royce Aardahl]

C'mon they tasye kinda like loon and bald eagle! enjoy!

[Captain B.R.K]

I really could care less what people do when they catch fish. Just pains me to see trophy fish being taken home to be fried in oil and batter that's all.

Bass, Walleye, Perch, Crappie.....all taste the same after a few beers

[out_fisherman]

Doesn't bother me that anyone wants to eat LMB, I just

feel that they might like some other species better

if they could catch them. I know for a fact that LMB

taste different out of different lakes (my lake and

my friends lake just over the hill). Weeds seem to play

a big part in taste, somehow. Then again, winter-caught

bass can be very good, from any lake. There are so many

variables involved, I think the best thing to do is just

ENJOY - thats what the fish were put here for.

Meanwhile, I'm still hunting that 29" smallmouth......

just for the record. Oh yeh, I'll release it (after about

14 rolls of film and exact measurements)

[riverrat56]

Sled-that was great LMAO

[EBass]

Personally I'll never eat a bass. I have when I was a kid along with anything we caught off the dock at my uncle's cabin. But now that I've grown up (or like to say that I have) catch and release is instilled in my way of fishing. I to get sad/mad when someone keeps some big ol bucket mouth, smallmouth, pike, musky, catfish, and walleye. 15" bass on up should be released and keep the smaller ones for a meal. I heard that it helps a lake if some smaller bass were kept. Key there is smaller bass. OK I'm done with my .02