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setting up for habitat restoration improving the health and survivability of tournament-release fish through fmd projects
By Steven Bardin and Gary Klein
Two 2024 Minn Kota habitat projects will focus on new “ recovery zones ” for released bass
Since the advent of tournament fishing , questions about bass behavior and biology have puzzled anglers and scientists alike . As tournaments continue to increase in frequency and participation , one of the more pressing questions is how fish recover and redistribute following weigh-ins .
An initial concern was that tournaments consistently releasing fish in the same site would create a highly localized population increase . This shift in population could in turn contribute to increased disease transmission , a crash in forage abundance and , in the long term , lead to the decline of tournament fisheries .
Studies from the early 1990s utilized simple methods of monitoring fish , including the marked recapture method , in which a fish is given a specific marking or tag at release so it can be individually identified during subsequent recaptures . These studies were limited by the tags available at the time and often experienced issues with tag retention and recapture reporting . But as they were refined and improved over the years , they began to show some trends in fish dispersal over several months . The only issue was that they could just provide a release point and a recapture point , with no way to know where the fish went in between .
Eventually the ability to track fish with surgically implanted internal telemetry tags became an available technique to track specific individuals . This unlocked true movement data and a much more in-depth knowledge of where fish went once released . The telemetry studies came with their own challenges , though , as the tags and monitoring receivers were expensive and had short battery lives . At times , the surgery itself could result in mortality . Thus , both marked recapture and telemetry studies have been combined to further improve our understanding .
what happens to tournament bass ?
The results of tournament release studies have consistently indicated that once a fish is released , it will most often stay within a half mile of the release site for the first month and within 1 1 / 2 to 2 miles for six to nine months . Species of bass , size of the water body and release location characteristics can result in subtle differences in dispersal distance , but for the most part , we can conclude that tournaments displace fish .
We can also say that there ’ s a low probability that a fish will return to where it was caught , even after a full year . It occasionally occurs , but there is not a repeatable pattern to
Survivability of fish weighed in at tournaments is a key area of focus for the
MLF FMD in 2024 .
predict which fish will be able and willing to return to where it was caught and put in a livewell . The good news is these studies have shown that , even on the most popular tournament reservoirs , there don ’ t appear to be enough fish caught and released in a single year to create the catastrophic population issues we once feared .
The other big question about tournament release fish is how they recover . This is a harder question to answer , because to monitor an individual and assess true postrelease survival , stress or recovery , you must first know how that fish was caught , transported and released and then be able to either monitor it constantly or recapture it in a way that doesn ’ t alter your results .
Thus , it ’ s almost impossible to provide a concrete , consistent answer about the fate of an individual fish . Instead , through decades of scientific research , observation and angler experience , a few guidelines have emerged as best management practices to maximize the successful release of fish during a tournament :
• The use of salt , ice and livewell pumps creates a proper livewell environment .
• Advancements in weigh-in procedures and live release boats provide the first steps to recovery .
• We know that released fish tend to seek cooler water temperatures , get out of current , position around habitat and capture forage . These components of recovery are essential to allowing released fish to thrive .
PHOTO BY MATT BROWN
10 MAJORLEAGUEFISHING . COM | FEBRUARY-MARCH 2024