What is your Northern Pike Consumption?

I love to eat Pike. I keep my fair share during fishing trips to Minnesota. However, I only keep fish in the 24-26 inch range. I only keep maybe 1 out of 10 fish I catch that are in that size range. Anything smaller than 24 inches is too tough to get the Y bones out. I think with a little practice the fish in this range are easy to clean. I did clean a couple 28 inch fish this year but they were kept by others in the group and against my will. It would kill me to fillet anything larger than that. I guess I just get too excited to catch a fish that size. I want others to enjoy that thrill. Once those fish are cleaned no one else gets to have that thrill.

I am not saying that I don’t think that others should be keeping those 30-something fish to eat but that I only catch a couple every year and I would like to have the opportunity to catch them a couple years later when they might be a couple inches longer.

Seth

I also prefer to keep a half dozen or so smaller fish each year too. The size I take is usually 22-23.75″s. These are caught through the ice. Lay them on the ice and the fish freezes so there is no slime to deal with. Many of the metro lakes I fish have 24-36″ slots to protect the bigger fish. I don’t mind filletting the smaller fish, and they produce plenty of meat in my opinion.