Gallatin steam plant

[bd-]

Oh but the crappie and bluegill are sooo good!

Seriously, bluegill are a lot of work to clean, but I'd rather have a bag full of bluegill filets than any other fish for a fish fry. They are tough to beat if you cook them right.

The nice thing about Tennessee is there is almost always some type of fish available and easy to catch if you want a meal. In the late winter, there are sauger and small stripers. In the spring, there are crappie and then white bass. In the summer and fall, you've got bluegill, catfish, trout, and bunches of other species.

Because of that, I don't store many fish in the freezer. There's just not much point if I can go out on any given weekend and catch something fresh.

bd

[StriperFan]

BD and Travis- good points, agreed and agreed, now we should let this thread get back on track. Anybody go to the steam plant today?

[agelesssone]

Went there today from about 11:00 AM til 5:00 PM. Great conditions, warm weather, 45-48 degrees, slight breeze, overcast. But the darn fish would not cooperate with me or anyone else that I talked to.

I caught one hybrid and three large drums. No sauger, cats, bass or stripers. Couldn't even catch a skipjack.

Guys were drifting, casting, anchored using cut bait and shrimp. I'm not shy, I'll ask people how they are doing and share with them how I am doing, looking for everyone to help one another.

On young fella had caught several small crappie, no keepers. It looked like he was casting a small stick bait.

I used live shad that I netted in the mouth of the discharge, average about 4 inches long.

Great day on the water, fun to fish, but exasperating on the catch.

Originally Posted by BOB

Enjoy eating those fish but please, only take what you can realistically eat.

Well I realistically ate both of them or was it virtual reality?

Originally Posted by StriperFan

Not speaking for Jugger, but as for myself, I will keep a couple at a time on one trip, and leave everything else I catch for the next few trips. The fillets freeze very well in water, and I have used fillets frozen in water months after the catch with no noticeable decline in taste or texture. TWRA stocks stripers as a food fish and they should be used responsibly. I don't think the picture shows any abuse of the resource in and of itself...in other words they would not go to waste around my house and I am sure they didn't at Jugger's either.

Thank you Brother and trust me when I say they did not go to waist. No I could understand if I had a boat load, but I had my limit! And realistically I CPR'd them= Caught packaged and refrigerated...LOL!

[bd-]

Like I said, there's nothing legally wrong at all about keeping a limit of fish, and you're within your rights to do it.

I just encourage "moderation" when it comes to keeping the bigger stripers. No problem with keeping one every once in a while for the table but I prefer to turn the rest loose.

bd

[agelesssone]

I once saw a guy take home five big stripers from a tournament weigh in. The fish were given to him by the fishermaen who didn't want the fish. How would he explain that to a game warden? No notes from the "givers" or anything to explain the amount of fish, which exceeded his "in possession" limit, not to mention daily limit.

This is the trouble with tournament fishermen who catch the fish just to be in the tournament. If they don't want the fish, do they just throw them away when they get home?

And they call themselves a "Sportsmen's" club?

Originally Posted by agelesssone

I once saw a guy take home five big stripers from a tournament weigh in. The fish were given to him by the fishermaen who didn't want the fish. How would he explain that to a game warden? No notes from the "givers" or anything to explain the amount of fish, which exceeded his "in possession" limit, not to mention daily limit.

This is the trouble with tournament fishermen who catch the fish just to be in the tournament. If they don't want the fish, do they just throw them away when they get home?

And they call themselves a "Sportsmen's" club?

I see your point, but if this guy took them home I doubt that he threw them away! Talking about clubs I joined a new one and it is called PETAS= People eating tasty animals and Stripers...LOL

[tkwalker]

Originally Posted by bd-

Oh but the crappie and bluegill are sooo good!

Seriously, bluegill are a lot of work to clean, but I'd rather have a bag full of bluegill filets than any other fish for a fish fry. They are tough to beat if you cook them right.

The nice thing about Tennessee is there is almost always some type of fish available and easy to catch if you want a meal. In the late winter, there are sauger and small stripers. In the spring, there are crappie and then white bass. In the summer and fall, you've got bluegill, catfish, trout, and bunches of other species.

Because of that, I don't store many fish in the freezer. There's just not much point if I can go out on any given weekend and catch something fresh.

bd

Now Blue Gills and Shellcrackers are the only two species that I purchase to stock my pond ... One as a food source for my Bass but mainly I love to eat them ... Especially the large hand Size monsters !!! Now I differ from bd ...

I like the gills and crackers on the hoof ... I just take a church key (the old style beer can opener that has the hooked/beak end) This is the best scaler you can use ... The gills don't have very many small bones so basically you can just fry them and rake the meat from there spine ... And they are good !!! <'TK><

[bd-]

Originally Posted by Tennesseejugger

I see your point, but if this guy took them home I doubt that he threw them away!

I'm sure that's true, but he was still breaking the law if he had more than twice the daily limit in his possession. "I was going to eat them" isn't a defense to violating the fishing regs.

bd

[bd-]

Originally Posted by tkwalker

Now Blue Gills and Shellcrackers are the only two species that I purchase to stock my pond ... One as a food source for my Bass but mainly I love to eat them ... Especially the large hand Size monsters !!! Now I differ from bd ...

I like the gills and crackers on the hoof ... I just take a church key (the old style beer can opener that has the hooked/beak end) This is the best scaler you can use ... The gills don't have very many small bones so basically you can just fry them and rake the meat from there spine ... And they are good !!! <'TK><

I hear you, TK. If I was the only one eating the bluegill, I'd probably just gut them and fry them whole. Same way with trout. It's definitely easier to clean them that way.

On the other hand, some folks never seem to get the hang of taking the meat off a whole fish, and it freaks them out if they bite into a bone. My wife is like that. She likes to eat fish but not if there's any chance of a bone.

Therefore, I've decided it's easier to just fillet them and take care of the bones on the front end. It takes more work at the cleaning stage, but they are easier to eat when they come out of the fryer. If you're having a fish fry with a bunch of people who don't eat fish very often, they will appreciate the fillets a lot more.

bd

Originally Posted by bd-

I'm sure that's true, but he was still breaking the law if he had more than twice the daily limit in his possession. "I was going to eat them" isn't a defense to violating the fishing regs.

bd

So when I kill a deer and take it to a someone that I know will eat it and feed their family with it. Are they breaking the law by taking it if they do not have a hunting license? I doubt it! And what if this guy that took those striper was not even fishing, had no fishing equipment what so ever in his possesion? Just saying!

[bd-]

No, but the fishing regs say that the possession limit is twice the daily limit. The daily limit on stripers is two.

Therefore, someone with five stripers in their possession has exceeded the legal possession limit by one.

bd

[agelesssone]

To be totally legal, the giver must give the taker a note with his information, name address phone number and hunting license number so DNR could check on the legitmacy of the deer meat.
The taker would have one in a million chance of being checked of course.

[txnative]

I've refrained from throwing my horse in this race, which has begun to devolve into another meat hunter vs sport angler debate, but certain implied points are not being stated explicitly. Point 1 is that while perfectly legal, keeping "bragging rights" sized fish is detrimental to the quality of a fishery. This is the dividing line between sportfishers and meatfishers. The tired line of "I never exceed my limit" is a poor excuse to damage a fishery's quality thru a slow-bleed reduction in numbers. If you were to keep 100 stripers in one day per year or 2 stripers a week during a year, there is still 100 less stripers in a fishery. One option is perfectly legal, yet at year's end, both are equally damaging to the health of the fishery. If your 100 keepers are 20+ lb fish, you're hurting both health and quality. Ethics SHOULD supersede legality here. Yes, you can keep what the law dictates, but you don't HAVE to.

Point 2 is less fishing-related and more personal. If a behavior or decision places you in a situation where you are defending yourself from the opinions of peers, you may need to rethink your choices. Most people on this site are ethical anglers, and coming under scrutiny is a sign you may need to recalibrate your ethical compass.

I think everyone here has had a trout, striper, bass, etc for dinner before, myself included, but constant removal of large, sought-after fish is unfair to others, and moreso to younger anglers. We all have heard the "ain't as good as it used to be" line, yet here we are repeating the same mistakes. As ethical anglers, we are charged with maintaing the health and quality of our fisheries for others, even if they are yet to be born.


Chris