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Thursday, November 22, 2007

Catch and keep vs catch and release.






Question:

Phil, You say that you appreciate all feedback so here goes. ..I think the way you have come to the Long Sault area and blatantly kill carp is disgusting. There are numerous operations on both the Canadian and American side of the Long Sault area that cater to European carp fisherman who strictly practice catch and release because they care about the carp. This area has only become popular for carp fishing in the past 10 years which is how I suppose you heard about it and now take advantage of this. I noticed you had the audacity to post a dead carp on a Long Sault operators sight. ARE YOU FOR REAL!!!! You will not be very popular next season in the Long Sault area are at all!!!

Answer:

Although we both have VERY different opinions, I still do appreciate the feedback.

I find it more disgusting that people would come hundreds of miles to simply hook a fish, torture it by fighting it, then release it, hoping to put it through the same ordeal again! This is true cruelty to creatures. Do you think that perhaps the carp enjoys fighting as much as the anglers do? The people you mentioned don’t care about carp, they care about themselves. If they truly “cared” about carp, they wouldn’t be anglers, they would be PETA members.



Many of the people you refer to are tourists, however I pay taxes to Canada, in addition to MNR license fees, so this gives me at least an equal right to fish there, if not more. I personally have been fishing the Long Sault area since the age of 5, which is WAY BEFORE any of these people and outfitters showed up in the first place.


Fish have been used for food for thousands of years before "catch and release" was ever invented. In fact, God designated carp as food when he created the world. Killing carp is not worse than killing chicken or beef (except for PETA).



Although I don't enjoy eating them, ALL carp that I have killed have gone to feed poor people in my neighborhood. Some had tears of joy in their eyes, as they received enough food to feed their family for a while, despite knowing about the MNR advisories, which I told them about before keeping any fish from that area. If you had no food to eat, I guarantee that you would NOT be releasing any food.

I release any carp I don't plan to keep, but the Ontario ministry has no limits on carp for a good reasons. Long Sault has more carp than many other species combined do and are actually classified as non native / invasive species. By taking 20-30 carp per year, I'm not harvesting more than your average walleye or perch fisherman does, and those species already have limits . The very fact that they have bag limits on other species proves that there are "catch and keep" anglers out there too.

3 comments:

Anonymous said...

Phil I fully agree with your views on Catch and Keep.

Marc Poirier said...

Phil, I'd rather not get involved, I like to eat what I catch myself but I don't really want to debate this. I think you were attacked by an ideologist personally, don't worry about it.

Anonymous said...

this is s tough point. I am stricly except in the rarest of situations (say fishing pristine water in the north, for trout or maybe walleye and i only keep my limit)a catch and release fisherman. My beleif and as I said it's my beleif only, is that catching and releasing at least allows the fish to go home recuperate and live on....sure it's somwwhat torturous to catch and then release but....killl it and it's dead! release it and maybe he's had a bad day for sure but he will get over it, and indeed live to swim another day and from what I hear from friends in the UK carp are never caught the same way twice due to their bieng very smart, and their ability to learn from their mistakes, or so i've been told, so unless a fisherman changes tactics that fish he will never catch again. i have a hard time understanding the catch and killl policy especially if you are not catching for yourself. i'm not a fan of catching fish for others really but thats just me. in the case of a religious or even a conscience point of view that catch and release is torture, as compared to outright killing a fiash well i say go and seek the input of others and in the case of religious beliefs in terms of ..if ya catch it beter make it worth it and kill it....seek out many opinions from those in the know. maybe there is a varying view out there as to what one religious person might think as compared to another. fish by the way do not feel pain as you or I (fish eat all kinds of things with spikes and points so a hoook through their mouth flesh does not register a true pain response as we know it)their brains are far less sophistocated than ours without going all scientific they fel stress and for lack of a better word nervous when caught to the pouint of being so nervous they can actually die when fought too long or hard due to lactic acid build up, and therefore the reason for proper release knowledge to release a fish so he can survive and not just turn belly up in the next few seconds after being let go of. Long story short...too late...I'm for catch and release but i think that when getting the opinion of others there are always varying degrees and opinions so find the opinion that suits you and do what you want. but at the very least don't break the bag limits thats the absolute non no. and for those of the UK there are so many carp here and so few to fish for them not likely that taking a few carp each year is going to hurt the fishing at alll in my opinion. gotta jet for now hope this helps

H