The DNR on Flatheads

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Trotline states should lower their high possesion limits and enforce the law instead of jumping the gun and making trotlines illegal. If in fact trotlines are deemed lethal, lower the amount of trotlines allowed to maybe 2 or 3.

I am done

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Or maybe designate waters as open or closed to trotlines…

This could be a great demonstration after several years, and could also demonstrate the recreational value of a few trophy fisheries – maybe the trotline free waters could have trophy-oriented catch, possession, and size limits. Hard to compare fisheries in different states with very different fishing pressures and well… different rivers. But setting up this kind of comparison within a state would be interesting.

ps fear that link to whiskerkitty.com/ I know it is a guide or something but I’ve never seen so many pictures of tables and coolers full of channel cats. I guess they really do have more faster growing ones down South.

I guess I’ve never had a problem with people taking a legal limit of fish…but the photos sure did make my stomach turn.

At least they promote CPR…

ALL FISH IN THIS SHOOT WERE RELEASED UNHARMED

I guess none were over 10#s.

In their defense, they are fishing large reservoirs and I saw coolers with smaller 3-5# channels, which isn’t going to hurt a fishery. In fact thinning out the youngsters probably helps. If you are going to keep them, this is the size to keep.

Yikes!!! thats alot of cats.

So much for relativity, eh? Well the TX. boys don’t seem too worried about it yet. Maybe things are different down there. Still, this feed the <insert local villa> mentality will take its toll some day.

Then they’ll move up here and discover we have a whole lotta bigger fish waiting to feed the neighborhood….

I think I’m gonna go bullhead fishing. I need bait.

PS: Tim_

I did get the fantasy thing you were mentioning. But the fact remains, that unless those two fish (flatheads now) are disposed of in a manner within the confines of the law (no wanton waste like turning into rose food), you simply cannot take another limit of fish until they are gone. Or rather, you can add as long as you do not exceed. That was my point.

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I do believe that legal setlines are harming the flathead fishery in Iowa

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I have to ask, and hopefully there’s somebody here who knows more than I, for I am not a cat man, but I occasionally run set lines in the small streams around home in Iowa. Skippy, who has already weighed in on this post and fishes with me all summer, perhaps can help me, but in fifteen years of fishing this way, I have never caught a flat, ever. Given, we never run trotlines, (I don’t eat cats anymore, clean them and take them to the old fellas in town and the ladies I work with, and we don’t run too many lines so we never get more than four a night) But we do this maybe three four times a summer, it’s an easy way for the lady friends to catch a fish and catch a bit of a feel for our passion without having to work too hard. All that said, the method seems far too ineffective for flats to be any real sort of threat to the cat population in the corn state? If I’m wrong, please tell me, only an opinion formed on subjective knowledge base………..

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I occasionally run set lines in the small streams around home

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I had no idea LB! We could be blood brothers!

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I had no idea LB! We could be blood brothers!

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You wanta talk about your basic scary thought

dave

A few things…

Define “small” streams. Twenty to thirty foot across – max?

And what do you use for bait when trotlining? Could be the reason flats avoid them.

Little b, right time, right place and right bait kinda thing. Some places it is really popular. Where it is popular, everyone in the whole area knows how to do it. If you just catch channels, I don’t see how you can really hurt the population except on a micro level. They are very prolific.

I was pondering to myself about the limit if MN 2 flats mini debate that was going on above and this is what I conclude. The limit is really 1 of decent size but it got my mind to thinking.

Fishhog thinks to himself, “That lil one under 24″ you can just eat for supper and go catch another. Hey I’ve got 3 kids that’s 3 or 6 more in the freezer and grandma needs meat and sister does too that’s 2 or 4 more big ones over 24″? And the church is havin a fish fry that’s a couple you can dip out of the freezer and replenish later, they gotta be big can’t feed the church on little ones you know you can only have a couple…..”

You have someone thinking like that in your stretch of river your sportfishing just hit the toilet. Well, if your river isn’t some giant huge fishery like the Mississippi and the backwaters that these guys are blessed with.

Viable arguments everywhere……… The only argument I’m invested in is that I am no blood relation to BrianK. He may suggest that because I’m really, really cool, but it’s not true. In answer to the small streams question, I should have been more descript. Small to medium inland rivers, big, but not the Miss. I run my set lines with the same stuff I’m fishing flats with. LIve suckers, chubs, green sunfish, and the occasional leopard frog or crawfish if I can get one. I believe the bait argument was right, not the type of bait, but the respiratory state, I belive flats don’t eat these baits because they’re placed out before sunset and simply don’t live long enough to interest a flat come dinner time. Regardless of the reasons whether or not people catch flats on bamk lines or trots, the real issue in Iowa, as has been said before is the enourmous limit on cats. Moreover, how much access does the average joe running a trotline have to big flat infested water? Although there is an exception to every rule, if a guy is meat hunting cats to feed his family, he probably can’t afford to invest in a boat, leaving him restriced to the areas he can walk to. How many of you guys catch your big flats from the bank? Hook number restrictions, restrictions on bank lines, etc. don’t mean didley when one can legally keep more fish in a night than ten people can eat in a week.

S

little b, not all rivers here even have flats? I’m not exactly sure where you are. people that catch more run lines many times a night. I don’t think the poor arguement holds water because if you were poor you wouldn’t be buying hooks and bait and spending gas money driving to the river, you would buy food in the first place. You are right though the limit is enormous and I’m sorry I’m draggin this out.

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it’s an easy way for the lady friends to catch a fish and catch a bit of a feel for our passion without having to work too hard.

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I had no idea LB! We could be blood brothers!

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Brian, I don’t think Sean’s fishing skills need much work but you might want to take a little time to teach your little brother a better way to entertain the ladies.

True, catfishing is very popular. However, my hunch is most of the fishing is done for Channel Cats, not Flat Heads. Channel Cats are easier to locate and it is not unusual to catch 20-30 in one outing on crawlers or stink bait.

I view Flat Head fishing as a much different and more difficult activity, probably because I haven’t done as well as most of you.

On a related note I am catching more smaller Flat Heads this year during the day, generally on Pool 5A.

I used to run setlines years ago on Pool 6. At the time you could have four lines, 100 hooks per line, and each line was 300 feet. Anyway, I got to know some of the really good commercial fisherman, and they specifically targeted Flat Heads because of their size, and consequently value (about 38 cents a pound back then). Hundreds of Flat Heads were caught on setlines.

I tend to think that on the Minnesota-Wisconsin section of the river Fathead fishing has improved, simply because fewer people commercial fish.