A sad end for a beautiful bass.......

[mrlitetackle]

Well i suppose i'll start with the fun part of the story.  I had just tossed my mystic popr (i wish they still made these, its my best popr by far) along the grass line at my favorite "lunker lake."  As i slowly bubbled it by.......BAM.....the explosion happened! This fish absolutely inhaled the lure, it fought like a mad man... it must have taken 8 or 9 thrashing jumps... It was 6lbs on the dot, and it fought like it was twice that size!

now for the sad part.....

upon returning the tired girl to the water, she was mighty sluggish. Which wasn't a surprise, but she just couldnt get going again.  I tried to revive her for about 10 min. before i realized it was all over.  There was nothing left i could do. I have never had a bass die on me before, its quite sad!  Well my pal and i were really bummed out at the sight to say the least, especially because it was a nice larger size bass.  So after a couple of minutes, we decided the only decent thing to do would be to take it home and eat it.  Normally, i never condone this...but we could not let her die for nothing!!!!!!

so thats just what we did......... :'( :'( :'( :'( :'( :'( :'( :'( :'( :'( :'(

[UrbanRedneck]

S*** happens, and its probably happened to all of us.  Some fish just up and die after being caught.  Its never a good thing, but its especially bad when its a very big fish.

[DINK WHISPERER]

Thank goodness that is never happened to me(yet)! I would be scared for life!!!!

[Mattlures]

If you catch enough fish you will kill one once in a while. It sucks but it does happen. I still have a 12.5 in my freeezer from 5 years ago that i need to make a mold of.

[mrlitetackle]

it was quite disheartening........ especially when the bass had gotten to the size that she attained :-/

but i will say, that it was a quite good meal.

im interested mattlures....... how did your biggun kick the bucket???

(was it too much stress, or bad hook/gill injury, etc...) :'(

[Bassin_Fin@tic]

Been there done that a few times.It can happen with trebles.It goes deep in the throat and pokes through the gills and then it is darn right impossible to remove from gills without serious injury.Throat is one thing,gills they're done for. This is the biggest reason that I hate and don't use sure set trebles either.They can cause catostrophic damage. >

Glad you enjoyed the meal at least.Any bass I ever ate that was over 2.5 lbs tasted like mud and worms. :-/

Nice catch though,shat happens.

[Mattlures]

the fish died from being gill hooked and bleed. it was a bad feeling. I havent accidentaly killed a big one since then. If i kill a small one (still very rare) then I dont feel bad. I just eat it. They are good

[Quitlimpin]

Not much you coulda done there.  It does make you feel terrible when that happens.  On the plus side, it appears that you have the best honey hole of all time.  

[tritz18]

It happens to everyone, hey at least you used the fish. don't worry about it

[mrlitetackle]

its good to hear that its happened to all of us (and not so good at the same time).....

as it was the first time for me, it hit me kinda hard.

thanks for the condolences.

[paul.]

likes these guys have said.  it's just part of the deal sometimes.  you do the best ya can and at the end of the day that's all you can do.  if's a blood sport.  the only way not to kill one every once in a while is to stop fishin'.  and i know you ain't gonna do that.  i had one die a few years ago that was close to 9.  hated it, but like you said, it woulda been even worse to waste it so it was supper.  better that than to just let the turtles eat it.  

don't sweat this man.