If you want that bonefish you just caught to survive, it is a really good idea to leave the fish in the water.  There is ample evidence to support that.  If you’ve sniffed around at the fringes of catch and release for bonefish the studies and best practices are pretty easy to find.

Many anglers were first exposed to bonefish, permit or tarpon in fly fishing magazines.  I know I was personally inspired to find my first bonefish by an article I read and the pictures I saw.  Inspiration is good.

The Bonefish & Tarpon Trust is hoping the inspiration can be done with the fish in the water.  Basically, they are hoping that magazines will start showing fish in the water to help anglers model this good behavior.

Here’s the full text of their letter to the fishing media asking them to use photos that support the best practices in catch and release fishing for bonefish, tarpon and permit.

Sounds good.

Support BTT

Today was a good day.  The weatherman dropped the ball on this one though.  Partly Cloudy would imply some clouds… not all clouds.  That’s what I had today with Captain Perry out of McLeans Town on the East End of Grand Bahama.

Captain Perry

Captain Perry was great.  He knew where the fish were, he knew what to throw and how it should be retrieved.  He didn’t get (too) frustrated when I cast on top of the fish for the 6th time or lead the fish by 10′ for the 7th time.

I was/am impressed with Captain Perry’s conservation ethic.  He knows how bad air exposure/handling are for the fish and whenever possible he avoided taking them out of the water or handling them.  He’s a good steward of the natural wonderland that is Grand Bahama.  You should be glad he’s out  there.

That bone is going to be just fine.

Conditions were not ideal.  The clouds made it really tough to spot fish.  Capt. Perry had it dialed though, and was routinely putting me on fish.  I botched a fair number of those opportunities and it took us a while to get the skunk off the boat, but once that happened, the fun began.

Day 2 Skunk Breaker

I love waterproof digital cameras.

A good time was had, despite the weather.  We used a magic/secret fly that Perry uses to get the skunk off and for the first several fish.  We then switched over  to a pink #4 Gotcha and again, it was money.  I fished almost the entire time with the TFO Clouser 8 wt. and TFO Large Arbor Reel.  I’m in love with both of them.

With Perry you fish hard, 8-3:30.  So, after being dropped back at the dock (he’ll pick you up in Freeport if you want, I wanted to drive out there) I hit a small flat I had remembered from my last trip.  The light was fading when I got there, but there were a few tailing fish.  I spooked a couple, but didn’t rush things.  A while later the tails popped up again.  I made  a good cast and quickly came tight on a bonefish.  Then, as it started it’s run, it just came off.  Bummer.

Still, 12 fish to hand on a cloudy, windy, cool day is good fishing in my book.  I highly recommend Captain Perry.  He’s a good guide and a good guy.

Another Grand Bahama Bone

Here's looking at you.

A great day.

Being on the water also meant I got to miss continues coverage of the disaster in Haiti.  The little bit of the news I did catch nearly brought me to tears.  The CNN anchorwoman actually started crying.  Luckily, the answer to global calamities is to go fishing.

A note on fuel… gas was about $4.50 when I was there, meaning a little over $100 of the day’s guide fee went to gas to get us out to the dumb fish.  It was painful for me to pay as much as I did, but the Captain is worth it and I am not getting anything in return for the positive report.

There was a great Op-Ed in Field and Stream about upcoming (and very important) meetings in Florida that will further detail what protections are and are not given to bonefish and permit.

The news isn’t so great.  It appears that the good folks in the Florida Wildlife Conservation Commission think that “catch and release” means you can’t touch the fish, despite C&R being on the books in lots and lots of states and countries.

From the article…

At the FWC Bonefish Workshops in October 2009, FWC staff stated that the FWC interpretation was that “catch and release” was equivalent to “prohibited species”. Based on FWC’s interpretation, this means that even touching the fish (e.g., holding a bonefish to take a photo, remove a hook, or to measure) constitutes ‘”possession” and a fine/ticket if witnessed by an FWC enforcement officer. This interpretation is counter to responsible fisheries conservation.

Catch and release is used as a fisheries management tool throughout the United States and in many places in the world. In these locations, catch and release is interpreted as releasing the fish alive soon after capture. Responsibly photographing, measuring, and weighing of the fish are permitted in these states.

They also appear set to roll back protections for permit that would include opening the species to spear fishing in federal waters and eliminating spawning season closures.

The comments to Field and Stream bit speak with one voice in opposition to the thrust of the article.  In fact, they use very similar wording and recite the same points.  Kind of reminds one of the Bush team hitting the political talk shows all reading from the same playbook.  Democrats aren’t organized enough to do that.  It all smells very organized and that smell stinks.

Midcurrent.com had an op-ed directed at the permit issue.s

You can read the Bonefish & Tarpon Trust’s press release about the issue here.  Once again, BTT is the leader on this issue.

Support BTT if you enjoy the tug of a bone, permit or tarpon.

After my bonefish vs. sharks (and cudas) post I put it up on a couple message boards and folks… well… they weren’t fans.

One guy even went so far as to suggest that pretty much any landed fish was going to die, specifically saltwater fish and in particular bonefish.  So, I had to go and find some more information.

The news was pretty positive.  Basically, if you limit your handling of the fish and limit the fish’s exposure to air, they are going to do well.  The good folks at Carlton University, again, had the goods.

In one study, out of 12 fish caught and tagged with gastric implanted acoustic transmitters one was killed quickly, one transmitter was found two days later and the 10 remaining  tags were still swimming around (in their bonefish hosts) at least 13 days later.

Here’s the study.

Ah… well… that’s nice to know.

Here are the conclusions reached as it pertains to how anglers, guides and fisheries management folks could help improve the survival rates of bonefish post-release.

Conclusion

The results of our study suggest that there are opportunities for anglers, guides, resource managers and conservationists to enhance the sustainability of recreational bonefish angling. …(1) Our first recommendation would be for anglers to land fish as quickly as possible and to minimize air exposure during the hook removal and release phase. A cooler or live-well aboard boats may provide an appropriate holding unit to minimize air exposure for this procedure. In fact, we recommend allowing all captured fish to recover for 2–3 min in a cooler or live-well prior to release. Fish that are returned to the water without losing their equilibrium should be better able to avoid predators and resume normal activities more rapidly. Because the likelihood that a bonefish will survive after release is substantially reduced in regions where sharks are abundant, distracting a shark by splashing may be helpful, but will not prevent all predation. (2) We also recommend, that when sharks are in the immediate vicinity of release, anglers hold their bonefish in a cooler or live-well and transport it to an alternate release location. This action may not be possible for anglers that are wading. If sharks are present and the likelihood that a shark will attack either angled or released fish is high, we encourage anglers and guides to relocate to an alternate location. If a captured bonefish is bleeding, we recommend that it be held in a live-well/cooler for 2 min to allow clotting before release or moved to an area with complex cover such as mangroves. The conservation of bonefish will depend upon anglers using strategies to release fish in good condition, such that they can avoid predators.  Educational material related to proper fish handling needs to be  disseminated to stakeholders around the globe that are involved in catch-and-release bonefish angling, or management of these fisheries resources.

I think in a subsequent study the idea of releasing the fish near mangroves turned out not to be effective as bones seem to head to deeper water, not the mangroves where lemon sharks are known to lurk.

Dr. Steven Cooke, our guy with the research goods.

On the rather long list of stuff I didn’t know about you can add the growing body of knowledge regarding bonefish catch and release mortality.

It turns out that, depending on what is lurking nearby and how long it took to take that picture, mortality of bonefish in the R part of the C&R equation can be up to 40%.  FORTY PERCENT! Holy $h1t!

(UPDATE: the study referenced here the mortality rate for bonefish that had lost equilibrium was about 30%, another study pointed toward 40%)

Forty percent… as a trout C&R angler, I’m used to thinking of that number more like 3-5%.  40% just seems totally unacceptable and I hope if you are reading this, you’d find it unacceptable as well.

How this came about… scientists, anglers, the Bahamas, bonefish… an intriguing mix that yielded some really interesting and important findings.

Whether a bonefish had or had not lost equilibrium was a significant predictor of predation, with bonefish losing equilibrium being over six times more likely to suffer predation than those that did not lose equilibrium (sciency stuff removed here). All other variables measured during the study (total length, angling time, handling time, air exposure time, bleeding, and water temperature) were not directly related to predation risk.

Fish that were preyed upon did not spend significantly more time further from mangroves than fish that were not preyed upon. In fact, following release 17 (20%) bonefish were observed swimming into open water (N2.5 m deep) rather than staying in close proximity to the shore line or in shallow water.
Longer air exposure and overall handling times were significant predictors of the loss of equilibrium in angled bonefish. Angling time, total length, water temperature, and bleeding at the  hooking site were not significant predictors of equilibrium loss.

If you want to read it straight from the abstract, you can find it here, courtesy of Cooke Lab at Carlton University (Canadian).  (Thanks Steve for the hook up on this study.)

So, what does this all mean?  It means dropping the Hero Shot is a really, really good idea if you care about that particular fish living.  If you can take a pic of that fish in the water, great… but if you do what I did on my last trip and take the fish out of the water (or have the guide take the fish out of the water) for an extensive photo shoot… well… it won’t go well for the fish and it may only have a couple of minutes left to live.

If the fish is unable to right itself when you put it back in the water, that fish is in trouble.  It could even be that these stressed fish even leave a trail of chemicals  behind them that predators like Lemon Sharks zero in on.

Jason Lozano, one of the anglers involved in the study had this to say…

With 15 seconds of air exposure 80% of the fish we released in one day were killed by lemons or cudas within 2 mins. If the fished avoided contact with the predator longer than 2 mins their chances increased substantially.

Jason pointed out that some flats clearly had more predators than others.  If you are fishing a flat with more cudas or sharks and you take that fish out for the glory/hero shot to the point it loses equilibrium when it is released, well, that fish will likely die soon.

So, to review… don’t take the fish out of the water.  It’s a bad idea if you want the fish to survive.

UPDATE: In the study referenced above, bonefish that had lost equilibrium had a mortality rate of 30%, while bonefish that did not lose equilibrium had a mortality rate of about 4%.

Bad Idea…

Knowing what I know now, I wouldn't have taken this picture.

Good idea…

Here’s how ya do it…

This, of course, is not how most bonefish ARE handled, but maybe your next bonefish, or my next bonefish will be.

Belize beat Florida and Hawaii to the punch, enacting new statutes that make it against the law to keep bonefish, permit or tarpon.  They have seen the light (that light  being the 1,800 jobs created by the sport fishing industry and the $60M that comes with it).

The Belize Sports Fishing industry is applauding the action taken by Fisheries Minister Rene Montejo, to protect high value sports fish like Tarpon, Bone Fish and Permit from exploitation, by insisting on a catch-and-release policy.

A new statutory Instrument states that “no person or establishment shall have in his possession any bone fish (albula vulpes) Permit (trachinotus falacutus) or tarpon (megalops Atlanticus), save and except in the act of catch and release.”

The Belize Sports Fishing Industry notes that several economic studies have been conducted in Belize, focusing on these three species for sports fishing tourism. The studies indicate the high economic value of these species for the local economy.

It has been estimated that these three species – bonefish, tarpon and permit together  bring in some $60 million a year and create some 1800 jobs.

(the above is from The Reporter)

Ya know, it’s good news.  Of course, there is the matter of enforcement, which is where this sort of thing falls down in practice.  Gotta  pay someone to go out and catch poachers.   Still, this step is more than has been done in Florida or Hawaii.  So, I say to Belize, “job well done!”

In California, with our small and geographically limited bonefish population, I don’t even see mention of bonefish in the CA regulations.  Might have to ask someone about that.

I would read the Puerto Rican bonefish regulations, but… I don’t speak or read Spanish.  If you do, you can find those regs here.

This says that bonefish and tarpon are Catch and Release only in the US Virgin Islands… that’s good.  I have no idea if that is enforced or  not.

Preach it, brotha!

Find that shirt here.

Some fights should be easier than they end up being.  In Florida, the Bonefish and Tarpon Trust is trying to make bonefish a catch and release only species (they are also trying to get permit to be catch and release only).  In Hawaii there is a long cultural history of eating bonefish (O’io), but the cultural depths of that practice in Florida are as shallow as the flats where these magnificent fish are found.

We know a few things about bonefish in Florida…

• They are big
• There are about 300k of them in Florida waters
• That number is a fraction of the bonefish population of 30 years ago
• A single bonefish contributes about $3,600 per year to Florida’s economy and about $75,000 over its lifespan.

So, the importance of bonefish minus the cultural weight of the fish should make this pretty easy… right?  Maybe, maybe not.

I read in the minutes (page 29) of one meeting of the Florida Fish and Wildlife Conservation Commission where the Coastal Conservation Association Florida took the bold position of opposing any change to size, bag or gear restrictions and also opposed catch & release for both bonefish and permit.  They also opposed a tagging program.  Ah… with friends like these, Florida’s remaining bonefish may want to slide down to Belize, where both permit and bonefish are protected species and catch and release only.

To help the Bonefish and Tarpon Trust out, check out their page about making bones C&R in Florida and let your voice be heard.  Let’s not be out-conserved by Belize.  Come on folks.

lease support BTT’s effort to make bonefish catch and release in Florida by contacting the Commissioners and voicing your support.  You can contact them by email (link to email not working) or by mail at the address below:Mr. Rodney Barreto
Chairman
Florida Fish and Wildlife Conservation Commission
Farris Bryant Building
620 South Meridian Street
Tallahassee, FL 32399-1600

Just came across this bulletin board back-and-forth about Hawaiian Bones.  The Phantoms of the Flats are not going to be C&R any time soon in Hawaii, I’d say.  For too many in the Islands, bonefish are for fish cakes.  One guy even complains about tourism $$’s… kind of like an Alaskan complaining about Oil money.