fish cleaning tips and etiquette

[fish_fan]

just wondering what people do or what is considered wrong

do you knock em on the head and bring them home to the house or clean em at the lake on the nearest picnic table.

where do you put the guts
do you toss them overboard, leave em on the ground, throw em off the end of the dock, or bag em and trash em.

do any lakes have cleaning shacks with running water etc, provincial parks.

whats the standard

[DiabeticKripple]

were we fish, there is a stand to clean your fish.

i believe its illegal to throw the carcass in the water.

we just fillet them at the station, clean up your station, and there is a garburetor for the carcass

[tight line]

clean all mine at home on newspaper( for filleting) then wrap them up in it and into the garbage. lots of stocked lakes seem to have cleaning stations, not very many w/ water. hate seeing people through guts into lakes/rivers other people use the lake too, and prob dont like seeing week old fish heads hangin around...lol

[Albertafisher]

I think it is illegal to toss the carcass in the water, although I kind of disagree with the logic.

[fish&fry04]

Story:

I was camping at Bow Valley prov park last year in July when there was major Bear activity within and around the campground (warning signs everywhere), I saw a man and a woman cleaning fish right outside the campground washroom. UNBELIEVABLE.

1), If you really want to clean fish anywhere near a washroom, especially rinsing in the sink and eat them yourself, go nuts, it's absolutely disgusting, but its your body.

2) I am camping here too, so are many others, so if you don't mind, STOP RINGING THE DINNER BELL FOR BEARS by cleaning your fish in the campground spilling blood and guts all over the ground.

pack'em on ice and clean them at home, or burn cleanings really well in a firepit.

P.S. yes I did clue them in on their extremely dangerous activity. Yes they were "clueless".

[iliketrout]

From P4 of this year's regs:

"If you clean fish in the backcountry, puncture the air bladder and throw
the guts into the water."

I believe the illegal part of this would be to fish in the same area as you just discarded guts into...I think this would be considered chumming.

[HunterDave]

clean all mine at home on newspaper( for filleting) then wrap them up in it and into the garbage.

x2 I have been known to gut my fish and throw the guts in the lake though. It's nice to give back and the fish don't mind a free meal now and again. :)

[great white whaler]

I like to clean my fish as soon as possible leave the gut pile on the shore line it feeds the birds.

[slivers86]

I like to clean my fish as soon as possible leave the gut pile on the shore line it feeds the birds.

I do this as well, fishing mostly on lakes in the praries, the sh!thawks, coyotes and other creatures probably take care of the carcasses in under 48 hrs.

[waterninja]

i always clean (fillet) mine at home, though iv'e been told by some oldtimers that the guts and bodies are "good for the river". i am curious about the post that suggests fish remains are illegal to throw back in the water. can see the chumming argument but i'll have to check the regs or give f/w a call

[ReconWilly]

That which comes from the water is part of the water and therefore should be benificial to the water, why couldn't the spoils be returned to where it came from to re-enter the food chain? This is a necessary part of salmon spawning tributaries, in essence the streams would have a hard time supplying enough nutrients to support the fish and other aquatic life without the rotting salmon every year.

[RavYak]

Never heard of throwing the guts back being illegal until this thread. If any of you have any basis behind this please let me know.

For me it all depends on where I am fishing and what is available. I find most of the lakes around Edmonton that I go to don't have a cleaning station so I just clean them up and throw them back in the lake. The carcass sinks and other fish/aquatic life feed on it. The only thing I say is don't clean and then just throw the carcass on the ground or in a bush or something, does no good(except birds) and stinks the place to high heaven.

If there is a fish shack I use it and every once in a while I will bring a fish home to clean but I usually at least gut them first as it keeps them fresher and allows the meat to cool off quicker when put on ice.

[nekred]

In Alaska... it is illegal to not throw guts in water when cleaning on shore... give back to the river or lake...

[The Fisherman Guy]

Always bleed and gut the fish as soon as possible after death.

I am a horrible human, I bleed the fish by cutting the gills while the fish is still alive. This drains the meat of adrenaline saturated blood and makes the fish taste better.

Once the fish is bled, I gut it and rinse very well. I then submerge the fish in ice, belly down to drain any excess blood from the meat.

All guts are returned to the body of water the fish came from.

[cube]

The reason for putting/not putting guts back into the water depends on that particular body of water. In most of the lakes around central Alberta, esp. around farming communities, there is already an excess amount of nutrients in the system and returning all that nitrogen and phosphorus simply causes excess algae and weed growth that latter contributes to summer and winter kill. In non-eutrophic bodies of water this is not really a problem and in oligotrophic lakes and rivers (eg. high mountain lakes streams) it would be a benefit.

Another reason a person might not want to put the entrails back into a water body would be the spread of disease.

[Jamie Black R/T]

i always clean at home.....i freeze the guts in a bucket with a handfull of oats and water then stick it out on the fence corner and shoot magpies off of it from the deck.

[thorne]

Just for clarification. I always gut the fish I intend to keep immediately and discard the intrails over the side of my boat. I have asked every official who has ever stopped to chat and all of them told me it was okay and not chumming. If you were to save up all the intrails over a period of time and then dump it......that's chumming. Filleting takes place at home or at the campsite.

[iliketrout]

Another reason a person might not want to put the entrails back into a water body would be the spread of disease.

Not criticizing, just curious because I don't know and I return guts to the lake when I clean at the lake. How would returning entrails to the same body of water it came from spread disease? I would agree with you if a harvested fish was diseased, and the entrails put in a different lake, but I can't see it spreading disease in the lake it came from. Wouldn't bodily waste carry the same disease and spread it every time a fish relieved itself?

I have asked every official who has ever stopped to chat and all of them told me it was okay and not chumming.

Good to know, thanks. I typically put my fish on a stringer and clean at shore, so it's never been an issue for me, but nice to know what the options are.

[BEL]

A friend of mine was cleaning fish at Pigeon Lake 2 years ago. Once he cleaned out the majority of guts he wandered down to the lake to rinse and get the last remaining bits clear. A Park warden told him it was illegal to do so but did not issue him a ticket because he did put the majority of guts in the proper fish cleaning station. The warden was basically informing him of the law. News to me at that time also. BEL

[cube]

[QUOTE=iliketrout;1420946]Not criticizing, just curious because I don't know and I return guts to the lake when I clean at the lake. How would returning entrails to the same body of water it came from spread disease? I would agree with you if a harvested fish was diseased, and the entrails put in a different lake, but I can't see it spreading disease in the lake it came from. Wouldn't bodily waste carry the same disease and spread it every time a fish relieved itself?

For most infections to take hold you generally require a number (to large number) of the infectious agent. The most infectious agent to humans "Shigella" requires about 6 infectious bugs to cause an illness but most other infectious agents require many more than that (hundreds to thousands). Hence why you do not get ill every time you run into E. coli but eat that uncooked contaminated hamburger and see what happens. Aeromonas hydrophila would be a fish pathogen that would work in this manner.

[TROLLER]

Just for clarification. I always gut the fish I intend to keep immediately and discard the intrails over the side of my boat. I have asked every official who has ever stopped to chat and all of them told me it was okay and not chumming. If you were to save up all the intrails over a period of time and then dump it......that's chumming. Filleting takes place at home or at the campsite.

X2

[pelada trochu]

i see dead fish sitting on the lake bottom for a long time. only the crawfish seem to like them. since not all lakes have crawfish, maybe some sturgeon eat them. but otherwise i expect they are just a nusiance to the swiming areas.

[pickrel pat]

i see dead fish sitting on the lake bottom for a long time. only the crawfish seem to like them. since not all lakes have crawfish, maybe some sturgeon eat them. but otherwise i expect they are just a nusiance to the swiming areas.

x2, they are there on the bottom for a long time.... seem to decompose in the water faster than being nibbled away by scavengers....

[BigIrv]

I actually called F&W about this a couple years ago. Yes it is legal to dispose of the remains by throwing them into a lake. They would rather have this then leaving them in the grass or forests. The remains add much needed nutrients to the lake anyway.

[Bfishin]

I see no problem with disposing of the remains in deep water or somewhere with a bit of a current, however... I once threw a couple jackfish remains in a quite shallow (~3ft) cove and within a couple days of soaking in the warm sunny water you couldn't stand the smell. Since it was near my dock I had to scoop up the remains and take them for a ride into deeper water. That my friends was the nastiest thing I have ever encountered by a long shot.:sign0161: