We have learned to and vent fish regularly, and I believe most live. There are so few fishermen left because of fuel prices and regs…anything is worth a shot. I just don’t know if we can make enough noise to stop this mess.Did any of you read about that 200 yr olf fish caught in Alaska…?? Most people wanted to string that guy up according to the comments…
OccamsRaiser, you make some great points about how many people will use recompression gear and how to quantify the results. The key to getting people to use the gear is to make it EASY and something that does not have to be used hundreds of times a trip. I have several ideas for making it easier to use as well as ways to prove the results. Any requirement intended to reduce discard mortality needs to be done in conjunction with reducing Regulatory Discards by aligning opening dates of co-occurring species and using appropriate possession limits to avoid extended closures. Everything needs to be legal at the same time as we target fish with higher limits while still being allowed to keep most of what we accidentally catch with lower limits. Any recompression requirement must also be tied to higher quotas as less of our ABCs are allocated to dead discards.
Redstripe, please check out the SeaQualizer videos and consider trying something like it while documenting the results on video or write them down. It seems to work better than venting since there are no dirty needles poking around the fish’s vital organs and the fish is quickly sent to an area it can better escape predators. I have no problem with that fisherman keeping his old fish and he did the right thing by allowing scientists to collect data from it. If a fish like that were illegal, it would be great if it was released in a way that gave it the best chance of survival. I would hate to see such a wonderful fish float off to slowly die as it baked in the sun and seagulls pecked out its bulging eyes before finally dying hours later. I witnessed that scenario play out last year as a beautiful 15 pound Red Snapper that scientists vented and discarded would not descend.
I have no tie to SeaQualizer. I have looked at similar gear and am still open to looking at other products.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=G5v9E-WvVhk
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=I8S_ocn2PME