Catch and Eat Best Practices?

I was wondering if one of the more knowledgable folks here might be interested in, or see the need for a rockfish primer of sorts, (although not necessarily limited to rockfish alone)?

What I'm talking about are tips and info that may be common knowledge to some of you, but to the Average Joe like myself, it may take years of getting info here and there, from this site and personal trial and error.

For example, I release 90% of my fish, but I do like to keep a few here and there to eat.  But I still harbor some residual guilt from keeping a HUGE ling late last year that was full of eggs.  Had I known ahead of time that a) Females are bigger, and b) Fall is the time of year they come in shallow to spawn, I would have opted to keep a different fish that day.  Lesson learned, but it was entirely preventable.

Other info that I wish I had known early on is don't bother freezing fish if you don't have a vacuum packer, or freeze it in a block of ice to prevent freezer burn.

So does anyone else see the value of a sticky that may outline some of this info to help out us newer, inexperience guys from making regrettable mistakes?

Don't beat yourself up over it Eric, it happens.



Check your line for abrasion and Re-Tie....OFTEN.

Oh, I'm over it, but at the same time I think there may be a need to educate and/or remind folks who might make the same mistakes.  Especially since we seem to be growing in numbers lately and the spawning season is here.

Not that I hold anything against folks who keep everything...  but I suspect a lot of bigger females would be released if people only knew.

Check your line for abrasion and Re-Tie....OFTEN.

Another good one, thanks!

Get the blood off the meat.

Savor that awesome belly meat WHEN FRESH, but don't freeze it - especially the big-veined Lingzilla belly.

Treat your fish like fruit - don't bruise 'em, it matters.

Eat it fresh whenever possible, but don't be afraid to freeze it.  I've had rockfish frozen for a year in a ziploc and it was great (not recommended, but possible...).  The key IS to keep the air off of it.  I DO use a Seal-A-Meal now.

My best trick for frozen fish is to soak it in milk before you process and cook it.  I think the milk fats "grab" the fishy taste/oil from the filets.  We had 5 months-frozen lingcod the other night and it was as awesome as the day it was caught.

Thank you, Gamma (Grandma Stockwell), for teaching me that trick.   

I learned that hard lingcod lesson too, Eric.  Not only is it a bummer to kill a loaded spawner, but you don't get as much meat per weight as a smaller (usually male) 8 or 10 pounder.  Get that video going and get your pics - you can have that released lingcod for a lot longer than one that's getting eaten.

Last - respect the resource, even when you're going to eat it.  Karma plays out through the end of that process!   

A great idea for a thread.

Off the top of my head;

1. Cabezon roe is poisonous when ingested. Be careful. Milton Love cites that 97% of green cabezon are females (and 92% of red cabezon are males). Thus if you throw back a green cabezon, you're almost certainly giving a female a chance to make more cabezonitas plus you'll save yourself the worry of being poisoned.

2. Predatory fish have big cheeks; eat them! (Especially Ling and Halibut).

Life says that you should learn sonething new everyday. I did not know those things. Please keep it coming with the information. I want to know.  One question- Is the only way to tell a female from a male is by the size?

If i'm not going to keep all rock cod, I try to only take the one that are obviously hammered by barotruama - regardless of size.  They're gonna die anyway.

I was once fishing behind a party boat, and they were throwing back all the small rockies.  There was a trail of belly up fish behind the boat.

Also, if you're not keeping rock cod, try to fish less than 60 feet.

Things I've learned,

If you keep your catch (whole untouched fish) buried in ice, you can go at least 3 full days and can't tell the difference from day 1.

Abs will also last 3-4 days but MUST be kept from actually touching the ice or melt water. Their flesh will soak it up and become "squidgy"

As Abking noted "get the blood off the meat"

Once I caught a nice ling, kept it and a couple of RF, got home dead tired, filleted all fish and threw the meat (unrinsed) covered with blood and slim into the frig to be eaten/frozen the next day after work. Don't do that, meat smelled and tasted like it was a year old. After filleting get the blood/slim off as soon as possible.

Again what Abking said, the milk trick works great.

Dale L



 

But I still harbor some residual guilt from keeping a HUGE ling late last year that was full of eggs. 

There are commercial fleets working offshore that catch hundreds of thousands of tons of fish every year. Catching your own local seafood is the best way to go.

A little more to the point, there is a poster I've seen that offers ID and life cycles of various rockfish such as lifespan, size at which they become sexually mature, etc. I saw one on a party boat and it got me thinking that size limits should be implemented on certain nearshore rockfish...

I think this might be it, but I can't tell...
http://www.rockfishid.com/JohnPRODUCT.html#WallGuide

Also, get a heavy-duty Shelton fish descender:
http://www.sheltonproducts.com/SFD.html

These should be mandatory, IMO.

I saw one on a party boat and it got me thinking that size limits should be implemented on certain nearshore rockfish...

For what, more floaters?  Fish descenders are not a 100% guarentee.


Tip:

If you're getting a bunch of torn swimbait tails or short hits then the fish are small and pecking the baits.  Downsize or move. 

freeze in a block of ice in a ziploc. keep the skin on while frozen.

I slab my fish, keep skin on, put flesh to flesh, put water in bag and freeze.

when defrosting, make sure the ice can drain out of the bag.

after skinning and trimming, I do the milk trick too. it does work.

you can smoke almost anything if you cut it up thin, put it on a cracker or toast with some butter or creamcheese. even rockfish. actually I really like smoked rockfish and so do my boys.

John

Oh no ... fresh water on salt water fish is a no no.  A quick rinse is fine, never soak.  If you want to freeze in ice, freeze the fish first, then put in cold water to finish the freezing off.  I've read some methods in which you can freeze first then slowly coat the fish with more ice by dipping it in water and freezing again, repeat until it is coated.  Sounds like a lot of work to me ... just get a vacuum packer already.

Bleed as soon as possible, get the residual blood and slime off.  If you're going to freeze with skin on, then make sure to get the slime off the skin, run a knife over it like you are scaling it, but in the opposite direction.  Better yet, just scale it both ways.  I think rockfish freeze fine with skin on.  Tuna ... get the skin off and a bit of the meat too as there is a small layer of fat (or ??) next to the skin.  I find the loin quality much better this way without the skin and the extra layer.

Ice as soon as possible.

Summary ... bleed, ice, don't expose to fresh water, keep clean.

BTW, I find blacks and blues don't freeze well.  I don't keep them unless I'm going to eat fresh or plan on giving it away to someone who will eat fresh.  Lings and Reds freeze fine.

Other tips, use the whole fish.  Someone mentioned cheeks.  Someone mentioned bellies.  But the collars are great too.  And the carcass makes a great fish stock.  And dare I mention fish head soup!

-Allen

I found this out by accident this spring, you can scale a fish using your garden hose and a fine stream nozzle.  I was blasting out the body cavity when I hit the outside of the fish and bang there went a bunch of scales, since then I've used it on striped bass to 22 inches and found with a little care it's quicker, cleaner and more complete than a knife or scaler.

Just lay the fish (before gutting) on a non slip surface, (I use my lawn, water conservation) then hose the scales off, takes a while to get the distance and angle but it works.  And you get to keep clean (more or less).