Seen some pretty disgusting pics from the Dale Hollow BFL of all the fish that died. What in the world happened?
Seen some pretty disgusting pics from the Dale Hollow BFL of all the fish that died. What in the world happened?
"Luminous beings are we not this crude matter." Yoda
Probably the old day time summer heat, but i haven't heard that.
Link to picture?
Was it worse than the Trition tournament that's held in June on KY lake from 3-4 years ago. They had hundreds of dead fish washed up on the bank at the release area. The buzzards were having a feast. The stench could be smelled long before you saw what the buzzards were eating on. In years past they had had small fish kills at the Trition tournament but there was one year where they had an epic fish fill. If my memory is correct they change the format to three fish instead of five just because of the mortality issues they were having.
The month of June is probably the worst month for tournament kills in the state of KY. The vast majority of bass recently spawned and this is when they are at their weakest. If you have some mild weather for the spawn and then the post spawn has warm weather with a significant increase in water temperature its a perfect recipe for delayed mortality. I will use my home water of Green River Lake Monday night 6/8 as an example. They have a 4 hour tournament on Monday night. I live close to the ramp so I swung buy there to watch the weigh in. I overheard one guy say they caught their 4 ponder in water that was not very deep and 20 minutes later it was floating in the live-well. It was not hooked deep nor was there anything abnormal about the catch. The fish just bellied up for no apparent reason...well I have an opinion but I can not confirm it, I can only speculate. When you have recent post spawn fish and water warming on a fast trend its a recipe for a stress fish. Then when you add a ride around in a live-well it puts more stress on them and sometime people will lose a fish. Rarely do you hear of a mass fish kill but the incident at Dale Hollow has happened before on a lake in KY water.
Last edited by JR19; 06-09-2020 at 12:21 AM.
The pics are floating around on bookface. Looks like water trough full of dead fish and some coolers were they collected the dead ones. If that many died delayed mortality will get another big percentage after the fact
"Luminous beings are we not this crude matter." Yoda
I don't have a FB account so unless its a public account I can't look at it. However I did have someone send me a copy of the picture your talking about. Hold them in a weigh bag long enough and they will stress. As an experiment tape a garbage bag around your head and see how long you can breathe. One source said they were way understaffed. Another source tells me there was way too much standing around with fish in the bag.
I think it’s time for stricter dead fish penalties. I can understand 1 and even 2 but if you have three or more your doing something wrong. Might get some attention if it cost some guys some major checks or points.
I'd say this covid stuff is probably causing delays like our local tournaments. Longer weigh in times equals more dead fish.
Throw them in the livewell & forget them in these water temps & heat is a recipie for disaster. If warm i'll add just a little ice at a time to cool them off, but not put them into shock & add some g juice. Knock on wood i've never had one die in my livewell. Not saying some didn't after, but my fish are always very lively when i get them out if i even put one in the livewell to begin with. I also run both aerators wide open all the time.
Found this picture on FB. It may not even be a pic from the Dale Hollow BFL, who knows. Even the post says "apparently".
Capture.JPG
I fished the tournament and I will agree there were a lot of dead fish, especially on Saturday. I can say that the tournament staff ran the tournament very well, and there were no long delays at weigh-in. The largest delay was to get a weigh bag, and it was not as bad as it often it. They always only set out 30 bags so that there is not a long line of people waiting with fish in weigh bags, and that was true at this event as well. Once I got my fish in bags there was basically no waiting to weigh them.
In my opinion its is a combination of post spawn fish and people not knowing the best way to care for their fish in the live well during the day. I also agree that the dead fish penalty should be more than it is.
Brett Graham
Louisville, KY
L\'raisin Anglers
Yea - that will make them take of care of them better. I am sure they are doing it on purpose. There could a thousands of reasons for a dead fish that is not the anglers fault. But that is the place we live in now. We have to place blame on someone. Cancel culture at its finest.Originally Posted by GoCats83
Not sure where you are going with this, or what you mean by your later statements. No one is saying that people are doing it on purpose, but if the tournament rules says you can't weigh or cull or cull a dead fish rather than a 4 ounce penalty then people will pay more attention to fish care through out the day.
Brett Graham
Louisville, KY
L\'raisin Anglers
Bass lives matter...we need to form a crowd and storm Bass Pro Shop, Academy, Sportsman Warehouse, Tackle Warehouse, LBF and loot everything and then burn em to the ground...bass lives matter.
to late in the year, high water temperatures 'around 79 degrees my 2cents .
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tournaments are bad in hot weather months. I like the mbf format, can watch anytime and no glory bags of stressed fish.
They should just have a fish fry and some beers.
Ranger Forever
Easy there bro! You didn’t read close enough! 1 fish I understand 2 fish I understand 3 dead fish or more and you did something wrong. You can say I’m a snowflake or whatever it is your trying to portray my view point as but you cant tell me there is an excuse for multiple dead fish by the same angler multiple times a year. You think a dead 8 pounder that will not be spawning in a lake again is a good thing?
Probably suffered from being caught deep.
The only way to prevent fish from dying is to not fish. Tournaments kill fish, fact.
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