ENJOYING THE OUTDOORS: CATCH AND RELEASE AN IMPORTANT PART OF FISHING

There's good sense in recycling such commodities as aluminum, cans, newspapers...and fish.

In a time of growing angler numbers and increasing pressure on wild resources, fishing remains as good as it is at least in part because of the practice of catch and release. Put them back; give fish more opportunity to grow and reproduce their own kind; catch them again.

Fortunately for all fishermen, there are many who believe that the most popular of game fishes are too valuable to be caught only once. Among a large segment of dedicated fishermen, it is considered sacrilege to kill the catch -- or to let it die out of neglect or brutal handling. Instead, it is admired and hastily returned to the water with blessings.

There is enough fishing pressure directed at the most popular fish species to significantly affect, perhaps even devastate, populations without man-made protection. In some instances it's imposed in the form of creel and size limits to restrict exploitation.

Self-regulation in the form of voluntary catch-and-release fishing goes beyond legal limits to keep fish numbers thriving. Appropriately, many of the most frequent and successful fishermen are those who put them back to fight another day.

Sport fishermen long have had a legacy of meat-hunting to overcome. It once might have been deemed foolish to chunk back a perfectly skillet-worthy fish.

Legal restrictions arose over a period of time when it became evident that the waters' bounties were not infinite. Finally, the concept of catch-and-release fishing took hold when more fishermen began to understand that the sport offered by better fish populations outweighed the mere fodder for frying pans they could provide.

Fishing for food as well as pleasure, of course, continues to be biologically feasible, especially regarding certain fish species. The panfish varieties, those that aren't at the top of the food chain, tend to be more plentiful and can be regularly plucked for the dinner table (within the realm of existing limits) with less chance of negative population results.

A fisherman needn't feel guilty about the regular legal harvest of such species as bluegill and crappie. Some popular predators like white bass and catfish also are plentiful enough that frequent harvest in accord with regulations is not a problem at current levels of fishing pressure.

Some of the predators that occupy the upper rungs of nature's food pyramid, however, tend to be less plentiful and more subject to significant impact from anglers' harvest. They also are among the most popular as fishermen's targets.

Depending on the particular geographic area in question, this could include the black bass species, striped bass, trout in many natural populations and muskellunge. Even in salt water, the largest of oceanic game fish are subject to yielding to angling pressures without the increasing popularity of voluntary fish release.

But aren't fishing regulations in place to provide all the protection the fish need?

"If everybody kept all they could under the legal limits, there would be no fishing left," said Bruce Shupp, conservation director for the Bass Anglers Sportsman Society.

Shupp, a biologist and former fisheries director for the New York State Department of Conservation before joining BASS, said most waters are subjected to enough fishing pressure that existing legal limits alone aren't enough to protect the quality of fishing for favored game fish.

"Studies that we did in New York in 1978 through 1980 showed that without catch and release, bass populations would have been devastated," he said. "Over a third of the legal-size bass were being caught each year. Over time, you wouldn't have had any fish left without voluntary catch and release.

"In the South, there are higher fish numbers, but fishing pressure also is more intense. Without catch and release, the quality of the fishing would be so low that nobody would want to go fishing."

The reality of fishing is that a rather small percentage of frequent, skilled anglers catch a high percentage of all fish caught, Shupp said.

"Thank goodness that those who catch 80 percent of the bass practice catch and release," he said.

Nevertheless, there's enough fishing pressure on most public waters, especially popular tourist destinations, that the less frequent and less skilled anglers have a substantial impact on game fish populations, Shupp said.

"The harvest that goes on around tourist accommodations is enough to hurt the system," he said.

Shupp said numerous studies confirm that harvest rates of several species of fish are directly linked to the quality of fishing. What fishermen take -- or return to the water -- does make a difference in how good the fishing is later.

"It doesn't work in all cases, but if it's fish that can handle the stress of being caught, by releasing caught fish, you can normally stockpile numbers of big fish," he said. "There are places where it's not necessary, places where there is little fishing pressure, but in most locations there is enough fishing that catch and release makes a difference. And it works with almost any species."

Among fishermen, bass tournament anglers with BASS in the lead have championed the cause of catch and release. Beginning about 25 years ago, BASS founder Ray Scott saw that the pressure of tournament competition demanded that fishermen not kill their catches. With tournament fishermen as an example, the notion of releasing all bass has spread widely through the sport fishing community.

"What we've seen with bass is that if you handle a fish well, its chances for survival after release are nearly 100 percent," Shupp said. "The best thing is to unhook a fish and never even take it out of the water."

Shupp said released bass, even those which had been kept in livewells and subject to handling in livewells, show good survival. Delayed mortality, fish dying after being released, generally is a low incidence factor, usually about equal to mortality of fish before they are weighed, he said.

"In New York, we found that if there was a mortality rate of five percent, it would be equaled by a five percent delayed mortality," he said.

"One thing is for certain, though," Shupp added. "If you don't release a fish, if you put him in the cooler, he's got no chance for survival. He's dead."

Steve Vantreese is the outdoors editor of the Paducah Sun.