Ask a CO: Fish sandwiches

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Originally Posted by rick_iles

Limits are catch and keep. No limits on catch and release. I can keep fishing with my limit in a cooler, just can’t keep any….

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I thought you couldn't fish after you hit your limit (not even catch and release). This used to be enforced - to prevent livewell sorting - keeping the big ones and throwing back the smaller ones. Although with the proliferation of tournaments now days, does anyone care if you are doing this? Used to be that any released fish had to be released immediately, you couldn't keep them in a live well and release them later if you caught a bigger one... Is that no longer an issue?

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Originally Posted by werner.reiche

I thought you couldn't fish after you hit your limit (not even catch and release). This used to be enforced - to prevent livewell sorting - keeping the big ones and throwing back the smaller ones. Although with the proliferation of tournaments now days, does anyone care if you are doing this? Used to be that any released fish had to be released immediately, you couldn't keep them in a live well and release them later if you caught a bigger one... Is that no longer an issue?

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Every tournament I've been at requires all fish caught to be live released after weighing (at least that's the rules,reality may be different). That required that fish be kept in a live well until then. Live well sorting was quite common. I don't remember that being enforced. Although I've attended a few,I've never been a big fan of tournaments.

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Originally Posted by trimmer21

Every tournament I've been at requires all fish caught to be live released after weighing (at least that's the rules,reality may be different). That required that fish be kept in a live well until then. Live well sorting was quite common. I don't remember that being enforced. Although I've attended a few,I've never been a big fan of tournaments.

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Looking through an older copy of the regs - 2012. There is some of the old phraseology. It carries through to the latest version - except for the last point which seems to have been dropped.

"Generally, daily catch limits include all fish that are retained for any period of time and not immediately released.". So once a fish is in your live well, it cannot be released - or if it does, it still goes against your daily limit.

But then it follows up with:
"Anglers fishing from a boat may now catch, hold, and selectively live release more walleye, northern pike, largemouth or smallmouth bass than the daily limit, provided: ... " - the conditions described are routine licensing and the use of an aerated live well.

It would appear that you cannot selectively release other species.

"If you catch a fish after reaching the daily catch or possession limit for that species, the fish must be released immediately back to the water." So you can't keep it and put back a fish already in the live well.

Then it follows up again with the old phraseology:
"Remember that all fish not immediately released count towards your daily catch or possession limits (also see Ontario’s catch and retain rules, page 9)."

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Originally Posted by werner.reiche

Looking through an older copy of the regs - 2012. There is some of the old phraseology. It carries through to the latest version - except for the last point which seems to have been dropped.

"Generally, daily catch limits include all fish that are retained for any period of time and not immediately released.". So once a fish is in your live well, it cannot be released - or if it does, it still goes against your daily limit.

But then it follows up with:
"Anglers fishing from a boat may now catch, hold, and selectively live release more walleye, northern pike, largemouth or smallmouth bass than the daily limit, provided: ... " - the conditions described are routine licensing and the use of an aerated live well.

It would appear that you cannot selectively release other species.

"If you catch a fish after reaching the daily catch or possession limit for that species, the fish must be released immediately back to the water." So you can't keep it and put back a fish already in the live well.

Then it follows up again with the old phraseology:
"Remember that all fish not immediately released count towards your daily catch or possession limits (also see Ontario’s catch and retain rules, page 9)."

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Why does the OMNRF bureaucrats make these regs so deliberately ambiguous? Frustrating is an understatement. The Ontario public service needs an enema.

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Originally Posted by trimmer21

Why does the OMNRF bureaucrats make these regs so deliberately ambiguous? Frustrating is an understatement. The Ontario public service needs an enema.

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The regs are sometimes written with an allowable tolerance range in order to prevent someone from using loopholes, and also to allow the responding officer to make a decision based on the totality of facts in that specific situation. The general thought is to follow the 'Spirit' of the rule not the 'Wording' of the rule.

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Originally Posted by Marker

The regs are sometimes written with an allowable tolerance range in order to prevent someone from using loopholes, and also to allow the responding officer to make a decision based on the totality of facts in that specific situation. The general thought is to follow the 'Spirit' of the rule not the 'Wording' of the rule.

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That is a huge problem if you get to court. It also means that the people put in charge of the regs publication aren't very good at their jobs. The "wording" of the rules should exactly match the spirit of the rules.

As pointed out, you can cull walleye, bass and pike. I’m sure those changes were made to accommodate tournament fishing.
Catch and release after you have a limit is ok. I don’t do it because you may deep hook a fish. I won’t release a deep hooked fish. Last year, we deep hooked a small walley, about 12 inches. He went into the tank. We ended up with our limit in the tank, one being about 8 pounds. When we took them from the tank and into the cooler, the little guy was gone. We found it down the throat of the 8 pounder. Only about the last 2 inches of tail stuck out of its mouth……

A few years ago we were leaving Lady Evelyn back down the dam and to the boat launch. Around the corner out from the river MNR was waiting and stopped us at the dock. The first question was "how many fish on board?" I told them that we had a few fried fish from the night before. Their response was "we don't care about the fried stuff, just fresh fish."
They checked our live well and cooler and were on their way. Didn't even ask to see the fried fish.