Hey, all this talk about making resolutions for other people to improve their fish-handling behavior, and taking photographs which preserve 30% more slime coat has me thinking about a story I was telling the other day.
-- When I worked in MO fisheries back in 2007 at Chesapeake hatchery, which was a warm water hatchery responsible for stocking (primarily) largemouth bass, hybrid sunfish, and channel catfish throughout MO, and also into parts of Iowa and Arkansas. That was a fun job. Aside from working in an aquarium shop, I can't remember another time where I was so soggy, tired, and surrounded by various stages of bacterial/protozoan/fungal disease.
About 2.5 hours south of there is Shepherd of the Hills hatchery, which is a cold water hatchery (rainbow trout). Since trout are generally pathetic, weak fish the daily "pulling deads" was (and probably still is) intense there. Having "milt fights" is one of the high points of what is otherwise kind of boring compared to warm water.
Here's the kicker! The cold water guys would collect many of the dead rainbow trout and stuff them into large PVC tubes, which were then placed into a freezer. There were hundreds and hundreds of deads -- if you want to see death and disease, visit a cold water hatchery. Then in late July we (warm water guys) would drive down to Shepherd with a wood chipper hooked to the pickup. We could spend most of a (generally 98F, brutally humid) summer day in coveralls, feeding partially-thawed, dead rainbow trout through the chipper to produce a "slurry". This mush was collected into rubbermaid tubs for a breeder catfish gourmet meal! The process is even more filthy than you can picture.
So that's the real beauty of trout fishing -- sweating, standing in coveralls while forcing tubes of dead trout through a wood chipper, with blood, flesh and ass flying all about, and then hunkering over the rearview mirror of the truck to remove bits of skin and flesh out of your hair.
So have fun with those great 2016 resolutions folks - keep those fights short and your hands wet!
Gene
http://www.tpfr.org
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