# legal to bleed the fish out in the river ?



## yonderfishin (Apr 9, 2006)

I know you are not supposed to gut or clean fish at the river , but if you are gonna keep a steelie , is it legal to cut the gills and bleed them out in the river ? Ive never seen anything saying its illegal and dont know why it would be but thought Id try and find out so I dont take a chance on getting caught doing doing it if there was some crazy law out there about it that I havent seen yet.


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## Brian.Smith (May 18, 2006)

No there is no law stating you can not bleed your fish out in the rivers.


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## yonderfishin (Apr 9, 2006)

Thats good to know. As barbaric as some may think it is , bleeding the fish out in the cold water while its heart is still pumping is the best way to get most of the blood out and have better tasting fish , especially with trout.


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## FISHIN216 (Mar 18, 2009)

Better than beating them over the head with a rock

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## Fishman (Apr 5, 2004)

I always do and it seems more humane than letting them thrash around on a stringer.


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## nforkoutfitters (Jan 25, 2010)

As far as I know as long as the fish is intact you can bleed it. It's the only way to go with steels you intend to eat as the meat is much more mild 


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## Nikster (Mar 14, 2007)

I bleed all my fish that I'm going to keep. Walleyes, salmon, trout, just everything. Makes for better tasting fish.

IMO: it's a stupid law! If that was the case in re; to bleeding a fish. Even dumping guts? I witnessed 1st. Hand via a camera when a gut pile was dumped in a harbor. About 2 gal's. what floated was being attacked by fish.
1st.
Pan fish were being fed. Saw maybe 20/25 perch gorging on the pile, northerns moved in & had a feast.

What sunk was being consumed by perch & crayfish they had a feast. Perch & northern's feasted on them as a end result. 

To bad we didn't capture it on film?

We did this as an experiment to see what happens.
NIK,


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## JohnPD (Jun 12, 2012)

This may sound stupid, but I've never bled out a fish, I always clean them when I get home, that is if I keep them. I usually catch and release no matter what I catch., except for lake perch or walleye.
So how do you bleed them out? Do you like stick a knife in their gills and cut, then put the fish in the water until they die?


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## jlami (Jan 28, 2011)

Nikster said:


> I bleed all my fish that I'm going to keep. Walleyes, salmon, trout, just everything. Makes for better tasting fish.
> 
> IMO: it's a stupid law! If that was the case in re; to bleeding a fish. Even dumping guts? I witnessed 1st. Hand via a camera when a gut pile was dumped in a harbor. About 2 gal's. what floated was being attacked by fish.
> 1st.
> ...


That is probably why it is illegal, to detter chumming. We would do it while catfishing on the mississippi.

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## Shortdrift (Apr 5, 2004)

The fish will bleed out more quickly and completely if you cut the throat instead of the gills. I tried both methods and found that throat cut will be lifeless in a minute or two, especially in cold water. Gill cur fish will remain alive for several minutes and even a half hour in cold water.
The only thing you have to be careful of is where you pount the throat cut fish as the blood will squirt a good distance. We always lower the fish into the boat livewell prior to cutting.


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## yonderfishin (Apr 9, 2006)

I usually cut the area clean through on the throat right where thr two sides of gills come together. To be sure most of the blood is gone it is a good thing if they take a few minutes to die or atleast for the heart to stop. The idea is to let the heart do the work for you , then much easier to clean later and they taste better. Blood can make a good fish taste bad


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## ShutUpNFish (Apr 17, 2007)

You really don't want the fish to be "lifeless" sooner IMO....The longer the fish is living and heart still pumping, the more blood will be pumbed out of the system. For some, I know this sounds more in-humane, but it makes for cleaner, bloodfree fillets. I simply cut the gills on both sides with scissors and dump back into the water to let bleed....some will remain alive for up to a half hour or so.

The ultimate BEST way is know as Ikejime...I believe its an old Chinese method where the spinal cord is cut at the base of the head and a long thin metal rod insterted into the spine. this allows the fish to continue to live and pump blood but yet be paralized...from what I understand, this method allows the fish to bleed out much more completely than any other method, but its certainly a PIA.


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## Steelhead Junky (Dec 29, 2012)

I have always had great luck with cutting the gills.


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