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Old 07-04-2020, 08:32 AM
Flatline Flatline is offline
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Join Date: Feb 2018
Location: Rome, Tn
Posts: 477
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Quote:
Originally Posted by tkwalker View Post
AS PER TWRA .... http://www.eregulations.com/tennessee/fishing/

Paddlefish: Paddlefish may be harvested from April 24 through May 31. Daily creel limit is 2 fish per
day with no size limit. Culling is prohibited. For exceptions on Center Hill, Cherokee, and Watts Bar
reservoirs, see pages 24 and 26.


This is really a catch 22... Paddlefish are plankton eaters and are caught in a net. I commercial fished for them back in the 70's and early 80's before all of the regulations took place. And really for a good reason. Hundreds of out of state netters were coming in here at night and stringing hundreds of nets and caught tons of these fish just for their eggs. There was a Russian embargo on Caviar so being that the paddle fish is of the sturgeon family we were getting $24 per pound. It took TWRA a while to catch on but they eventually put a limit on them.

Now in your case a accidental snag? So actually you weren't fishing for paddlefish. Also culling is prohibited? Paddlefish are like Stripers they spend a lot of energy on trying to escape and lactic acid sets in, this is the reason for that rule.



Thanks for the education...
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