Thread: What Caused the Fish

Originally Posted by Mississippi Slab

We had no problems keeping fish alive. We use one of the blue cube coolers on wheels with O2 set at 1/16th. On tournament days we attached clips to the fish to help them stay upright but on Thursday we kept 12 fish alive in the cooler withour the clips.

The FEW fish we caught the week before died quick in the live well, but once we saw that, we put them on o2, and they did fine.

I bought one of those 110qt Igloo coolers from Sam's Club that has wheels and a retractable handle similar to the cube design only much larger. With the O2 setup, it's a nice live well on the rear deck, and has enough room for minners too.

What size weight, and what kind of clips do you use Hugh to hold the fish upright? Does that really help? I've never done that before.

These are clips you attach to the fins on the bottom of the fish and they make a big difference. One of the reason fish die after being caught is they use up all their energy trying to right them self in the livewell. They stress out and die.These clips keep the fish upright and they are able to release the air from their swim bladder. Some people use a neddle to bleed the air out but with the clips the fish is able to do it and you don't risk hitting the fish in the wrong spot with the needle. Google Flip Clip and check it out. Its a must have for tournament fishermen!

I have seen air release from the bladder of fish before but those were usually caught deep and the fish were vented prior to their release. Even the eye would pop out when they were brought to the surface. I though these fish were caught at around 7-10 ft of water. Would you need to vent a fish coming up from that shallow of a depth?

We did not have any problems. Fill the live well and put the 02 to them. I will say we did not have many volunteers for this study.

Originally Posted by Mississippi Slab

These are clips you attach to the fins on the bottom of the fish and they make a big difference. One of the reason fish die after being caught is they use up all their energy trying to right them self in the livewell. They stress out and die.These clips keep the fish upright and they are able to release the air from their swim bladder. Some people use a neddle to bleed the air out but with the clips the fish is able to do it and you don't risk hitting the fish in the wrong spot with the needle. Google Flip Clip and check it out. Its a must have for tournament fishermen!

Thx buddy!!!

Originally Posted by BigRiverMarine

To die so fast in the live wells at Grenada the past 3-4 weeks? Anyone have an educated answer ?

We did not have a problem keeping fish alive--6 Friday and 3 Saturday.
All were caught in 6 to 12 FOW and had the live well running constant.

I got no idea, never fished a tourney and never cared about keepin them alive. I put mine directly on ice and I have about a 2 hour drive home from the lake not counting the time it takes to get back to the ramp and load the boat and there has been a few times where I had a couple still movin when I got em out to clean em.