Deep in the temple of catch-and-release fishing
by Alan Kesselheim
http://www.hcn.org/wotr/dir/WOTR_020723_Kesselheim.html

Not long ago, a friend told me a fishing story.

He and his son were paddling the Big Hole River, one of Montana's renowned trout fisheries. Along the way they decided to catch some dinner. They cast over those legendary waters until they had three trout, which they bonked on the head and stowed. Then they quit.

At the take-out they were packing up when a drift boat of fly-fishers coasted in. There was a heady level of banter going down, along with a lot of backslapping amid claims of a day's catch of more than 50 fish.

One of the drift boat guys sauntered over to chat. Suddenly he saw the three dead trout. The sight stopped him in mid-sentence. "You killed those fish," he spluttered. His friends looked up, shook their heads. Accusation lay heavy in the air.

"I heard you guys say you caught 50 fish today," my friend said. "Caught and released," said the fly-fisher, looking significantly at the corpses.

"We stopped after we caught three for dinner," my friend said. "If even one in 10 of the fish you caught died, you guys killed more fish today than we did and probably injured a few more." The debate stopped: There is precious little rational ground when it comes to sin, and my friend had murdered three trout.

This tale and others like it illustrates the extent to which this business of hooking and freeing fish has gotten out of hand. Given the popularity of angling these days, the catching-interruptus concept does have merit. But it's another example of our tendency to overdo a good thing. Who needs to catch and torture 50 fish at a whack?

Beyond that, it's another example of the what-we-can't-see-we-can-ignore syndrome we so easily get seduced by, and that has tripped us up before. Witness how eagerly we've dumped our garbage in the ocean and over-fished the commons.

Once trout have been hooked, fought, brought into a net, unhooked, remarked over, photographed and then placed back in the water, they are forgotten. Usually they flick away and disappear. Sometimes they drift, dazed, for an anxious few moments before floating off to revive. Sometimes they remain lifeless in the current. Except for the fish stories that follow, they are gone.

Fact is, catch-and-maim might be a more accurate banner than catch-and-release. Biologists see increasing numbers of scarred and disfigured fish in heavily fished streams. Mortality rates are tough to pin down, but it's clear that some caught-and-released fish die from the trauma. When push comes to shove, justifying any mortality on the basis of satisfying our urge to repeatedly bend a rod and play fish is a stretch.

Dick Oswald, a career fisheries man with Montana Fish, Wildlife, and Parks, admits there are times he asks himself, "What am I doing?"

"I'll defend hunting and fishing to my last breath," he says, "on any terms, without reservation. But if you put me on a stand and made me defend going down a river and playing with fish all day, I'd probably turn into a babbling idiot."

Another thing. A disturbing undercurrent of selective treatment crops up here. There are the chosen and the scorned. Trout are exalted. So, too, are Arctic grayling, various salmonoid species, walleye and small-mouth bass. But then there are the less attractive members of the fish clan, at least to the human eye. The bottom feeders. Whitefish. Catfish. Suckers. They aren't pretty to us, and they don't get equal treatment on the end of filament.

It isn't uncommon, along a Montana stream bank where the catch-and-release credo is fully worshipped, to find whitefish or suckers -- "trash fish" -- chucked on the bank to gasp out their death throes in the obscurity of the disdained. Even if catch-and-release practices are adhered to, when it comes to the less-favored, there's an increased tendency to rip out hooks, toss the fish and get on with the chasing of more sanctified prey.

I'm fighting the tide. It's heresy to blaspheme in the temple, and now that whole regional economies in the West are feeding at this altar, it's enough to get me thrown out of town. But what about lightening up a tad? You know, ease off on the obsession with hooking things, and simply drift along from time to time put the rod down -- notice the birds, think about life and close your eyes and feel the river.

At the very least, cut the guy who just fishes for dinner and stops for the day, a little slack at the take-out.

Alan Kesselheim is a contributor to Writers on the Range, a service of High Country News in Paonia, Colorado (hcn.org). He writes in Bozeman, Montana.

OK, I'll confess. For native steelhead, I'm guilty of looking down my nose at those who kill them even where it is legal. Interesting article; thanks for posting it.

Sounds kinda PETA-ish to me.

Do we have to boycott circuses, zoos, and rodeos too?

Plus, if you can catch 50 a day, you must either be Roland Martin , or there's a sh!tload of fish in the Big Hole river!

its not PETA-ish, it just points out the fact that the fly fishing elitists are not as innocent as they think they are...although im not sure about the "close your eyes and feel the river" part, that water is cold

A 10% figure [" 1 in 10 " ] for hooking mortality is more than double reality. When I catch and release trout I very rarely use a net, very rarely take a photo, the problem with the above story is that in my experience most catch and kill advocates kill limits not limit their kill.

The story holds true and when one looks at what is happening in Montana, Colorado and Wyoming, states that see far more flyfishing pressure than we do out here in the NW. It is true that when fly fishing started to gain popularity in the late 70's blue ribbon trout rivers in those states improved immensely. The push for C&R brought new life to many rivers that had been fished out like the Madison River and many others. Fish became healthy, numerous and big in a few short years. Folks who had fished the rocky mountain states for years said that fishing had become the best it had been in thirty years or more. We all took pride in our pushing for catch & release we were seeing our rivers become healthy before our very eyes.
But good things can go bad just take a look at our national forrest trail systems. Because of the popularity of back packing we now have many, many new trails to hike, that can be a good thing if your into it. But to ask someone who has been into back packing for 25 years or more if back packing is better now and you will usually get a yes and no answer. Trails are more crowded than ever, damage to the enviroment due to over use is growing. The opportunities yes are more but the chance for a quality back packing trip just keeps getting harder to find.
The same goes for fishing, all types of fishing. I'm 99% a fly fisherman and have been for 38 years. This is not about the good old days but now and the quality of fishing we have now and what it will be like in the future. We are seeing throughout the country the once gain on quality of fishing due to conservation and due to the new interest in fishing in the late 70's right through till now begin to go down hill. Why? We are loving our rivers to death by over use and over use no matter how carefull we are results in a down hill slide. Why do you think rivers are private in Europe? because there are just too few rivers and too many people and they have realized for so many years that no matter how carefull you are too many people will ruin it for all. We have seen the introduction of whirling disease spread, trout streams where once wild trout have become virtuale pets that know the game and once hooked will not fight for there life anymore they somehow know they will be released or maybe they are just so damn exausted from being caught often they can't put up a fight again. We have now seen many trout rivers void of certain insects that once were so plentiful hatches were in the blanket form across the entire river. Why? The studies are just begining to come and we are finding that it is not raw sewage or over developement it is we the fisherman with our over population on these rivers and our wadding habits even though carefull that are killing off the aquatic life. Another loss of quality we see happening from year to year is the plain good old act of just going fishing and being able to enjoy it. We only need to take a look at all the complaints here on Bob's site about low holeing, noisy jet boats, etc,etc. Yes these guys who think they are better for the enviroment with their 50 fish days of C&R are as every bit destructive as any killer of fish. We the fisherman are just begining to realize what fish&game departments across the states are begining to talk about behind closed doors that good conservation does not a damn bit of good if more is better be he a dead fish for the fire or fifty fish caught & relaesd and 5 of those fifty could be wasted also.
I will defend C&R where it is truely needed but I am sick and tired of seeing our beloved sport of fishing become something it was never ment to be through slick greedy marketing by the industry and their conservation preaching so they can have more fish for more fishermen which means more money. If that does not make sense to you then watch any fishing show and you will see conservation and sales side by side. We may now be reaching the top of the falacy that through conservation that everyone can have their cake and eat it too. Are we not seeing more privatizing and restrictions of our fishing places. It's just not greed but the fact that there are too many of us fishing and no matter how conservation minded we are we are still destroying that what we love.
How do we decrease the amount of us fishing without infringing on the right of everyone to have that right to fish????

That, my friend IS the 64,000 question.