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Tag Archives: catch and release

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Some days I am not sure what to blog about.  Some days I have something in mind. . . . Then my phone starts ringing; the internet starts “chattering”.  A couple of things have been hot topics at my desk this morning. . . . Know the Regs!!!!! I can think of at least one news release we published already this open-water season reminding anglers to know the fishing regulations.  I can also tell you that not a day goes …

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What’s Biting? Blue Catfish!

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Wanna share with you some things I have been seeing on the interwebby lately.  Blue catfish are the coolest of our large catfish species.  When I say that I do not mean they wear shades, I mean they are the most active in cold water.  Sure, we get some excellent channel catfish fishing around Nebraska as soon as the ice is gone, and channels can be dried off through the ice too.  But, big predatory blue catfish are actually very …

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Catch and Release Works! Big Time!

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Many times I have shared how catch & release can make fishing better, for everyone.  The fact is catch & release is an important part of sportfishing today.  In some cases that catch & release will be required by regulation, in other cases more and more anglers are choosing to voluntarily release fish, big fish especially. I have noted how big fish can be released and “recycled”, caught again, Fish Recycling.  Here is another example that caught my eye this …

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What is a Fish Worth?

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I am going to plagiarize myself in this blog post and repeat something I wrote a few years back, back before this whole blogging thing.  I will update some figures and so forth, and add some comments, but this originally ran in the January/February 1998 issue of NEBRASKAland magazine. Determining the value of a fish is difficult.  Some anglers see fish and fishing as an integral part of life and might consider fish priceless.  Others might set its value based …

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Motivation

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If you need it, there are all kinds of books, videos, and speakers available today to help you get motivated.  Motivated to do what?  I do not know, I guess motivated to do whatever you want to do, whoever you want to be. I want to catch big fish. Nothing motivates me more than some pictures or better yet, videos. . . . I know these videos have been present on the internet for at least a few days already, …

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Barotrauma on Ice

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I hope many of you have looked at the title of this blog post and wondered, “What in the world is “barotrauma?””.  Barotrauma is the pointy-headed fish biologist term for what happens to some species of fish when they are quickly raised from relatively deep water to the surface.  Most species of our freshwater fish have swim bladders–internal “bags” of gas that the fish use to regulate buoyancy.  Fish living at depths of 20-30 feet or more only have a …

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New Year’s Day 2016

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Some of you may remember from previous years that my calendar is organized a bit differently than other’s.  New Year’s Day for me falls on whatever day I am on the ice for the first time each ice fishing season.  That first day on the ice is the beginning of my new fishing season, my new year.  With the mild fall and early winter this year, New Year’s Day fell only a couple days before I needed to hang my new In-Fisherman …

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Yes, Fish are Slimy!

Buried deep in the volumes of Nebraska State Statutes, Chapter 37, you can find this: 37-542. Fish unlawfully taken; duty of angler. All fish which cannot lawfully be taken shall be returned to the water at once with as little injury as possible, if taken, and before removing or attempting to remove such fish from the hook it shall be the duty of the angler to first wet his or her hands. Now, some will immediately throw up a red …

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Bonus Fish

We, the Nebraska Game & Parks Commission, will stock somewhere around 290,000 channel catfish into nearly 200 different waterbodies in the state this year.  Most of those fish will be around 9-10 inches long when stocked.  Included in the waters that will be stocked with those 290-some thousand channel cats will be many of the state’s relatively small, park, urban, and community lakes and ponds.  The fish stocked in those waters will be relatively easy to catch and located near a …

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Bed Time for ‘Gill

I have pursued, and caught, some of the biggest, baddest fish that swim Nebraska waters.  Spending hours, even days fishing hard with little to show for it knowing that the one fish I might catch could be huge is not a problem–love fishing like that every chance I get.  But, I also love a little more action and a return to my roots, the same roots most of us anglers share, sitting on a shoreline dabbling bobbers and baits in …

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