Article by Capt. Mark Sampson
As I started this article on catch-and-release, the first thing I did was write up an outline of all the talking points I thought should be covered. “Plan ahead” made the top of the list because to properly release a fish, anglers should have the proper tools such as de-hookers, pliers, leader snips, nets, gloves, wet rags and anything else that might be needed to safely handle and release a fish. “Release for the future,” was also on the list because I was going to work something in there about how catch-and-release is a good way to ensure that our children and grandchildren will always have fish to catch. “Reviving fish” was on there too because I figured I should mention how anglers should sometimes take the time to gently rock a worn out fish back and forth in the water or slowly pull it along with the boat so that it would be properly revived and strong enough to swim off on its own. “Take good photos” was last on the list because when you release a fish all you’ll have to convince the folks back home that you really caught something is your word and your photos, and let’s face it, a lot of us fishermen leave much to be desired in the “believable department” so good photos of one’s catch will go a long way in convincing the spouse, “Yes honey, I really did go fishing today. See, that’s me in the picture with my fish!”
When I got through with my outline I realized that I only had, as you can see, enough material to make about one paragraph worth of text, which I knew simply wasn’t going to cut it as an article worthy of being printed in the Coastal Fisherman Winter Issue. Sure, I could get “wordy” and stretch the heck out of the outline topics, but that would just be rehashing old how-to stuff about catch-and-release that most readers have probably heard a million times already.
So I decided to take on this topic from another angle, by looking at what part catch-and-release plays in the realm of sport fishing and what it is that prompts some anglers to so enthusiastically embrace it while others shy away. And how important is catch-and-release to the foundation of fishing anyway? After all, fishing as we know it today certainly didn’t start out as recreation. The roots of our “sport” involved no sport at all because it was originally all about acquiring sustenance. Thousands of years ago, when our big-browed, hairy ancestors finally swung down out of the trees and started this whole fishing gig there was no catch-and-release. Back then it was all about catch-and-don’t-starve. We know that a lot about fishing has changed since then, but despite all the progress, there’s a lot of evidence that shows you don’t have to look too far to find relics of the Stone Age still fishing right alongside of us.
In the 17th century, Izaak Walton published a masterpiece of a book entitled “The Complete Angler.” Even with today’s use of high tech gear to catch species of fish that had not even been discovered in Walton’s time, anglers can find much of his discussions of techniques, as well as his quiet philosophical approach to the sport, remain both relevant and useful.
Walton hailed fishing as a “noble endeavor” and while he may have been the first, he certainly wasn’t the last writer to suggest it was practiced and professed by those blessed with “enough upstanding virtues of patience, perseverance and uncommonly heightened moral and ethical values to be labeled as a “gentlemen”. However, on today’s waterways, where there is so often evidence of too many fishermen chasing too few fish, it can be difficult to discover where the gentlemen anglers are hiding and certainly where the nobility of the sport resides.
I don’t know at what age he started fishing, but I do know that Izaak Walton was sixty years old when he published his book. After having spent more than fifty of my own years standing in, near or floating over the water while hoping that something sporting fins and a tail would ingest my offering, I’ve too often been inclined to conclude that fishing is anything but a noble sport of gentlemen. Like ugly weeds sprouting up among a beautiful garden, my critical impressions of a sport which I both love and make my living from have come about after countless times witnessing anglers who obliterate any chance of moral, ethical or “sporting” standards being a part of the process of fishing.
The pure essence of sport fishing is simply to transition through what should be an enjoyable endeavor of trying to catch a fish. Along the way anglers must work through issues with weather and water conditions, tackle, bait and equipment, locating the fish, getting close access to them, and a host of other obstacles that stand between them and their catch. It’s a process that at times can be as ridiculously easy as stopping along a roadside pond with a cane pole and a baited hook to catch a bunch of bluegills, to making an 80-mile offshore run across choppy seas to try and hook a blue marlin. But “fishing is fishing,” and whether it’s easy or challenging we can derive such immense pleasure from just doing it that anything that comes from it, such as a tournament win, a photo in the Coastal Fisherman, or a cooler full of fillets should be considered nothing more than the icing on an already very tasty cake.
But when fishermen focus so much on the “icing” rather than the true essence of the sport, they’ve stepped away from what sport fishing is all about along with the morals and ethics that make up it’s foundation. I guess a big consideration is how far down the list is an angler willing to bump the “fun factor” when they make their primary goal of the day to fill a freezer with fish or show-off a big catch back at the dock.
It’s difficult for me to think of fishing as a noble sport when I remember a glorious calm day in August a bunch of years ago when four fellows chartered my boat to go offshore fishing. The ocean was alive with fish and we caught bluefish, king and Spanish mackerel, bluefin tuna and yellowfin tuna. It was one of those days when you couldn’t go ten minutes without hooking something. But as the day progressed, there was a growing irritation in one of the fishermen. Finally the sixty-some year old fellow stood up and said, “If this is the way it’s going to be then I don’t want to have any part of it.” He then stormed into the cabin, sat down on a bench and, and with arms crossed in front of him pouted like a little kid.
“What’s wrong”? I asked one of his friends.
“Oh, he’s just mad that we can’t keep the bluefin tuna since the season is closed”.
“But we have three yellowfins in the box and all those other fish” I reminded him.
“Yes, but that’s not good enough for him. He wants to keep everything he catches. He feels that fishing is a waste of time otherwise”.
Apparently he wanted a big helping of icing that day and could care less about the cake. I wished at the time I knew the right words that could have made that man see things differently. But I didn’t, so all I could do was let the grown man sit and pout until we got back to the dock. It was a pitiful example of how some people look at fishing and unfortunately a memory I’ll never forget.
I’ve seen anglers do horrible things to unwanted fish. I watched them fight over fishing locations, and listened to them argue like children over their radios. No, even though I make my living from it, I do not consider fishing a “noble and gentlemanly” sport. Fortunately, fishing does attract at least some gentlemen and women to it, and just about the time I’ve had enough of all hype and hypocrisy of the sport, I’ll witness random acts by such people that sheds light on how Walton could have come to his conclusions so many years ago.
I remember a particular charter where none of my clients that day had ever caught a mako shark before and all had hopes of bringing home a sample of the tasty fish. In the morning, we released a few blue sharks and then a small mako, but no keepers hit the line until mid-afternoon.
As soon as the hook was set the mako jumped and it was obvious that the 200-pounder was a keeper. While only one angler actually fought the shark, the rest of the crew assisted with encouragement and other cockpit tasks. For the next two hours the shark provided a constant battle, never letting up on the angler as it maintained a constant vigil of runs and jumps.
During the two hours of the fight, I witnessed something I had never seen before. A change had transcended over the entire six-man party. During the first hour of the fight the familiar “get that sucker in the box” attitude prevailed, but as time progressed, comments like, “what a magnificent fish” and “absolutely beautiful” were echoing across the deck. In the last half hour, the angler looked up from the fighting chair at his friends and said, “He’s fighting his heart out,” and within seconds the six had unanimously agreed that the shark should be released. In short order the mako was to the boat, a few photos taken and it was set free.
When we returned to the dock that day our fish box was empty and my clients walked past the cleaning station where their catch would have been cut up. But they were as happy and satisfied as any successful fishermen I’ve ever seen. They weren’t worried about their picture in the paper or meat in the freezer; in their minds they had a great day – period. Gentlemen? I would say! And in my book “that’s” what sport fishing is all about.
Young fishermen today are growing up in an environment where releasing fish is slowly becoming increasingly accepted not only as a sometimes “required” practice by regulations, but also as a major part of the fishing experience. While their grandfathers probably could not conceive the thought of going fishing without a cooler full of ice ready to receive every speck of the daily catch, today’s youth have an opportunity to learn early that they can have a perfectly wonderful day of fishing even if they don’t bring home a single fish. As long as we don’t stand in their way, young anglers can skip the “keep’em all” part of the learning curve that took so many of “us” older folks a lot of years to rise above. As parents and mentors of young anglers, it’s critical that “we” set the example, but sadly too many parents don’t have strong enough catch-and-release beliefs and practices of their own and so the proper seed is not always passed along to their children.
Whether all fish are released, brought home, or no fish are even caught, anglers must understand that the greatest part of being an angler is the opportunity to get out and make the casts, cut the bait, drive around in boats, wade through steams, see the sunrises, admire the beautiful waters and all the other stuff that goes along with the sport of fishing. When someone gets so focused on catching fish-after-fish-after-fish just to fill a freezer back home, they lose the opportunity to look up from their reel long enough to savor the reality of who they’re with, where they’re at and what they’re doing. And if the cooler isn’t full at the end of the day, I know some who will conclude that the adventure was not a success! How sad is that way of thinking?
One day we had a small triggerfish swim up to the boat while we were shark fishing. Two kids and their parents where really getting a kick out of watching the antics of the fish as it swam around the chum bucket. They marveled at how it could swim forward and backward without ever kicking it’s tail, and how at times it would come right up to the surface and seem to look right at them. They fed it little pieces of bait and even gave it a name. For a half hour, they more or less played with their little friend until Dad learned that triggerfish are very good to eat. Before any of them realized what was happening he grabbed a rod, dropped a hook in the water and had the fish flopping around in a cooler of ice. For enough fillets to make a small sandwich, he totally blew all the fun he and his family was having.
Don’t get me wrong, I love fresh fish and thoroughly enjoy eating everything from makos to sea robins, but when I go fishing for myself it’s purely for the fun, the challenge, the excitement and all the other good stuff that goes along with the experience. Hey, if bringing home some good eating fish is a part of the “other good stuff” then that’s great too, but I’ll be darn if I’d let it cast a dark cloud over my fishing memories. If the season is closed or the fish is too small I’ll release it and be just as happy that I had the opportunity to hook it in the first place. Maybe I’ll catch the same fish next year when it’s a keeper, or maybe not.
When fishermen look into an empty fish box and feel that their “job” that day is to fill it with fish, suddenly they’re working. If they free themselves of that burden, and focus solely on enjoying a day of fishing and all that comes of it, no matter what the outcome, they will have a successful day. When I see six guys who just got off a charter boat with their “limit” of 18 tuna trying to figure out what they’re “going to do with all these fish”, it makes me wonder how far we’ve come from that naked Neanderthal standing in a steam trying to spear his dinner with a sharp stick. And when I see six guys get off a charter boat with 24 tuna because the captain allowed himself and the mate to be included as anglers so that six more yellowfins could be put on the boat that day, it makes me wonder how in the heck a Neanderthal could drive a boat let alone pass a captain’s exam!
I’ve had the privilege of knowing some of the best fishermen in the business, including top notch charter boat captains and mates, famous “TV fishermen”, world class tournament anglers and six year-old rookies who don’t even know which way to crank the reel. In my book, what has them worthy of respect and admiration and defines them as a true “sport fisherman,” is not that they’ve been doing it the longest, can catch the most or the biggest fish, and certainly not because they keep the fish cleaners busier than anyone else. It’s simply their attitude and the pure love they have for fishing and all the fun, excitement and lifelong memories that go along with it. And to the very last one, if there is anything that they all have in common it’s that putting dead fish on the dock is always very low on their priority list.
No one can dispute the fact that if harvest was left unchecked, the ever increasing human population and it’s demand for recreation and seafood would eventually bring about the demise of many of our marine resources. It’s obvious that catch-and-release fishing will play an increasingly important role in the future of fishery management. Hopefully through the continued effort of the media, public education, outreach programs, good mentors and responsible parenting, young and even old fishermen will grow to accept and appreciate catch-and-release as an exciting, necessary and fulfilling element of this wonderful sport. And while I may never agree that fishing, by itself, is a noble sport, I do wholeheartedly agree that there are those among its ranks who demonstrate the best of what a sportsman or woman can be.
Capt. Mark Sampson is an outdoor writer and captain of the charter boat, “Fish Finder”, docked at the Ocean City Fishing Center.
