Quote Originally Posted by Nutbush View Post
Oh I’m sure my one time per year cranking doesn’t hurt the population very much, but the guys who fish 3-7 days a week can really put a hurting on them with treble hooks.But when it’s all about numbers and bragging rights, then who is really going to take the chance of losing a fish with a single hook???


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It's not as much a common occurrence as your trying to make it out to be. Sounds to me like you killed more fish in your one outing this year then I have since the end of May fishing two or three days a week. Take your time removing gill hooked fish, I usually have to go in behind the gill plate and remove them from the bottom side and push them back thru. Very rarely do they rip their gills putting up a fight bringing them in to the boat. The majority of the fish I catch get the rear treble in the lips, lose a lot of fish as well. Some days they just slam them and swallow them, but it's rare also. I have just as many if not more fish that swallow a jig or a Aberdeen hook with a minner on it. If you don't pull cranks but once a year then I say you don't have enough experience to base your information / opinion on. Also, if every fishermen killed 5 or 6 fish every cranking trip then there would be dead short fish floating all over Sardis and Enid lakes.