Crappie Fizzing?

[Loop_Dad]

It's not a bass question, but I would like to know this as it can come up time to time fishing for bass.

 

today the water temp was 56-58. I was fishing 30-40 ft of water. I got a good size crappie on my jigging spoon. When I try to let him go, he almost looked like he was dead. He was non-responsive. He didn't look like he was blown up. He didn't want to swim and when he finally left, he came up belly up 30 sec later. I scoped him with my net. Then he started swimming down like crazy in my net. I put him out of the net and he dashed down to the deep.

 

I am guessing this was swim bladder issue and went into almost like shock state(?). Can crappie be fizzed  the same way as bass?

[wnybassman]

A couple years ago I got into catching late summer/early fall crappie here pretty good and they all came from 18-24 feet or so.  Caught and released 10 or 12 one of the first days when I looked behind the boat and realized I was leaving a trail of floaters behind me.   Went back through and scooped them up with the net, and could only keep the ones that measured.  They floated in the livewell also, and I tried both fizzing them and attaching the fin clips to keep them upright.    Neither worked.   Fished for them several more times that year, and many of them came to the surface nearly dead looking.  I could hold them in my flat palm and they would just lay there for as long as I wanted to hold them.   I finally kind of gave up fishing for them deep like that because all I was doing was killing them.

[slonezp]

Couple weeks ago had the same problem with some white bass I pulled out of 18fow. They were floating in the livewell. No problems with the walleye from the same spot. I wasn't releasing the fish, but I put the aerator and recircs on and they recovered in the livewell. Water temp was 40* I can't answer the fizzing question as I have never fizzed a fish.

[00 mod]

They normally don't fizz in the fryer, no?  :eyebrows:

 

Jeff

[webertime]

I saw something about this on in-fisherman. They held the gill covers closed blew in to the crappie's mouth and then threw them quickly into the water (almost like a lateral with something behind it).

[Loop_Dad]

I found the following:

 

/////////////////////////////

 

I can't find who posted this initially, so I apologize for plagerism. But I saw it here and tried it today and it works 100%.

Unhook the fish
Squeeze his belly until his mouth begins to close or you hear air coming out his nostrils (I guess that's what they are)
Drop him back head first so he goes down a few inches under the water
Kiss him goodbye cause he ain't floating back up to become gull food.

I caught over 100 fish today and released all but 20- not one floated back up.
I also showed several other guys how to do this and they were receptive for the most part.

Try this and show others and we'll have a much bigger crappie population next year and maybe fewer gulls.

 

////////////////////////////

In this thread: http://www.crappie.com/crappie/north-carolina/161487-how-release-fish-caught-deep-water.html

[KyakR]

This seems to be a really important topic to all anglers who catch and release........wonder why it's not brought up that much?! I had no idea fish could get the "bends." 

[Ratherbfishing]

My intention isn't to hiijack this thread so apologies in advance if it seems so.  But it seems like a lot of caught fish have "bladder control problems."  The host of a Canada trip i went on last summer caught a 39 inch pike while trolling a surface bait.  It couldn't be resuscitated and after it was cleaned to be eaten, it was determined that it's air bladder was "blown out."  We guessed that it must've swam up from deep water, intent on grabbing an easy meal, and then rushing back down again-only to have it's plan foiled.  We were glad it was outside the slot so we could keep it and it' wouldn't be wasted-although there were plenty of eagles, seagulls and crows around which would've likely had a nice meal of it too.

[Loop_Dad]

Ok, the technique I quoted above worked today. I squeezed the stomach of crappie and I heard the hiss sound, I pinched the tail and hanged the fish head down, extended my arm out and let go. It dove into the water and I didn't see it again.