Thread: Acceptable ways of landing fish

Although I have spent my last three vacations fishing on or near the pier.(with generally good luck) ...I still have a lot of "googan" in me on certain practices. I want to honor the aceepted practices of the pier regulars and locals. The one issue I am really unsure about is the accepted practice of landing large fish..primarily Kings. Most of the large fish that are caught are gaffed. Is it acceptable to try to land the fish in a pier net if you don't want to keep or kill the fish? Because of the congestion on the pier...particularly around the Octi...I realize netting might be difficult and may be more likely to hang up other fisherman.
Had some problems with my computer shutting down...hope this doesn't post twice.

I think netting is fine, however it's just as easy to pop the fish off, the hook won't cause much of a problem for the fish, it should rust away shortly. But there again, if you want to weigh it or have your pic taken with it and don't want to kill it, net it, but get it back in the water in short order, Kings don't live long out of the water. Just my thoughts.

kimg mackeral will not live even if you do net them. the amount of time it takes to bring the fish up to the pier and remove the hook WILL kill it. if you dont want it break it off or find someone else who wants it.

Netting a king is usually a bad idea because of the razor sharp teeth will destroy a net. I'm with everyone else just pop it off or ask if someone wants it before you pop it off.

Yeah that's true, I hate it when fishing for spanish, sometimes you'll get a short king. I try to toss them back quick but probably only 1 in 5 survive from what I've seen. Bigger kings put out so much energy when fighting that a lot die or are very close to it before they are landed. If you try to bring a green one up, its going to be dangerous and be very hard to bring up. The quicker you bring it in though, the better its chances for a healthy release. Redfish are much tougher, and can be released no problem.