I’m planning on catching and maybe keeping a couple of walleyes in the near future. With the hot water I’m thinking of tossing them in a cooler of ice. I know in a previous post someone mentioning cutting them to make them bleed out leaving very white flesh without bruising.
Do you believe in doing this and where do you actually cut them?
We do that in the winter, but never in the summer. Don’t know why, I guess mine stay plenty lively in the livewell and I hate hauling ice around unless I have to.
When we bleed we either slice the gills on both sides or slice the tail to the bone about 1/2″ into the fish. We do this in the winter when we do not want to run livewells. Just a bucket of water and let them bleed out.
I can honestly say I can not tell the difference.
clip them with a snips or kitchen shears on the underside between the gills we call it there “throat”. toss them in the livewell for an hours or so with the circ pump running.
Put all keepers in a cooler with ice. 
I cooler all my walleyes from July on.
I also cooler all my salmon and lakers. These are the only fish I will gill. My only reason for this is a cleaner cleaning table it has nothing to do with taste. Much less blood mess.
I have never had any taste or cleaning issues with wallaye when not gilled.
Quote:
Put all keepers in a cooler with ice.
..X10.!!!.If you are going to keep fish with these HIGH water temps.There is ONLY ONE place for them ON LOTS! OF ICE.! ……….RRR
Quote:
clip them with a snips or kitchen shears on the underside between the gills we call it there “throat”. toss them in the livewell for an hours or so with the circ pump running.
I agree gill them and put htem in the livewell but we have literally gilled fish on the drive back to the access put them on ice on the drive back hom and cleaned em and not an ounce of blood. I personally dont think an hour is necessary and with hot temps I want my fish on ice ASAP. – Quintin.
Cooler and ice for sure if you have it….
I try to cut and bleed all mine. Not sure it effects taste one bit, heck after frying I’m sure it wouldn’t. But, the clean up is easier, and you have very clean white fillets without a lot of rinsing.
Bleeding fish makes cleaning much less messy. I clean all my fish at the landing and then ice the fillets for the trip home. Cleanup is a breeze-jerr
I bleed all of my fish winter and summer. I use a fiska shears and clip the red gills themselves. Then put them back in the livewell. It only takes about 3 minutes for the fish to bleed out and then I put em on ice or clean them. After cleaning all you have to do is rinse the fillets, instead of soaking them for days like people do. Not to mention the cleaning board has no blood.
I bleed all fish as It enhances the taste.
You must be logged in to reply to this topic.
