Fish-Hawk.Net

Hey Guys, with Pike & Walleye set to open soon, I was just wondering a couple of things. Obviously you can't always avoid OOS fish but if I'm fishing a white Big-O for walleye and the MNR show up, am I in trouble? Also, if I hook a bass by accident and its a big fish or has some cool features to it, whats the protocol on picture taking and releasing. Is that allowed? With a world of social media today, could you get fined for posting a picture with an Out Of Season fish?

Just a couple questions I have heard different answers to over the years and wanted to be sure before hitting the water this year.

Check out the search feature, this topic comes up every year and has been discussed at length. Bottom line about pictures is it's going to depend on officer discretion if you got caught. I know someone who had conservation officers show up at his house with some pretty serious fines and seizures being threatened for posting pictures of OOS fish to a popular fishing website.

When in doubt

The answer is no

I believe the regs are quite clear on this subject, all OOS should be returned to the water immediately. Selfies and other people snapping pics with their phones are helping increase conviction rates. General rule is that one OOS caught might be a fluke but more than one OOS caught, it is time to move to a different spot/deeper water etc.

As below, quit looking for loopholes and do what the regs say. Release immediately, move, change tactics. It is a bass,or some other fish, unless it is growing an arm there are no shortage of fish pics. If it is growing an arm, then a CO would probably let the picture slide.

I caught what was close to my PB pike on Sunday. Broke my heart not to be able to get a nice picture with her. If I had been more on the ball and not freezing my butt off I would have taken pics while she was being unhooked.

So that might be a good way. If you can unhook them while they're still in the water, even better, but perhaps get photos of the release instead of the usual pose/selfie? That way you can still be good and get your picture

I look back to a couple of years ago, and hell; even my introductory post here on this page and shudder at my ignorance with regards to fishing regs. The way we all learn is from from experience and asking others.

So, yes there are tons of great threads on this subject already on the board, thank you for bring it up again as it brings it to everyone's attention, and some of those people may be new like we all once were and not as wise as we should be to handling OOS fish

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Also if at any point in time your defense is going to be along the lines of...
"Well Johnny from fishhawk said it was ok". There will be a darwin award in your future.

For my OOS catches,.. If possible unhook in the water and release. If it's a really nice fish have your partner snap some shots during said release in the water,.. if you are solo it's a memory.

This winter while on lower Rideau .. I witnessed a family catch a pretty large bass. I had the binoculars out to see what the kerfuffle was about and saw the fish. I didn't like that they lifted it out for a picture but it was a kid that caught it .. big moment. Go for it but be quick.
But then they had it out of the water for quite awhile each taking turns getting pictures with it. That's when I started sounding off to get it back in the water before it dies.
There was quite a bit of surface water, they dropped the fish, missed the hole and chased it under the truck for awhile.
After they got it down the hole they packed up and took off.
I was not very impressed.

Unfortunately not everyone follows the regs.
I try unhooking OOS and obvious out of slot fish in the water. I usually have my camera/phone ready to go so that a shot can be taken while the fish is in the water.

Dont play football with it, and definitely dont eat it. lol

Markus wrote:Dont play football with it, and definitely dont eat it. lol

Eating it would be really bad......

It doesn't matter how big the fish is, you are not allowed to take pictures of it. As soon as you notice it's OOS it's not hard to let slack in the line. Most of the time the fish will spit the hook right away. Or if hooked with mupltiple hooks there's no reason the fish needs to be out of the water for more than a minute. Keep pliers handy where you can easily grab them

My biggest question every year is how does the MNR determine if you are targeting an OOS species? I always have the fear that I'll be fishing for early spring black crappie with a micro jig, and a MNR office will say "oh, that's a jig, clearly you're fishing for bass" or when pike open and I throw a spinner. These are bait well known​for other species that are OOS but work great for in season fish.

Jason Daoust wrote:It doesn't matter how big the fish is, you are not allowed to take pictures of it. As soon as you notice it's OOS it's not hard to let slack in the line. Most of the time the fish will spit the hook right away. Or if hooked with mupltiple hooks there's no reason the fish needs to be out of the water for more than a minute. Keep pliers handy where you can easily grab them

No where does it say you cannot take pictures of an OOS incidental catch. It indicates release immediately. As stated by others if it's a good catch and the situation is appropriate photograph it in the water. Otherwise just release and skip picture.
As for letting slack in the line to let it go,.. I can't see that being a high percentage release method.