Bleeding from gills

[larkmark]

I was fishing a special regs creek. Delayed Harvest. A lot of the Rainbows I caught had noticeable bleeding from gills. I have seen this before and just thought maybe others have also? I think I only see it on the Rainbow Trout. Other than that the fish look healthy and even their mouths do not show much damage from hooks.

 

[Dave_W]

That seems strange. I have never seen a trend of bleeding rainbows.

The PFBC mostly stocks RTs these days. I suppose it's possible in a section where a large number of gut hooked fish were released by a single angler on a single stretch of stream could lead to this... but I would think such injured fish would not likely be caught again the same day. A more plausible theory to me would be some sort of physical reaction to being stocked in a stream with different characteristics than the hatchery water.

Hhmmm. . .

 

[larkmark]

Yeah. This is something I have seen in past years on this same stream. It is artificial lure only and majority of fishermen use flies. I don't think I have ever seen it in the Brown Trout. It is sometimes a fair amount of blood too.

 

[FrankTroutAngler]

I would guess that most likely the blood came from where you hooked the trout. I can't imagine catching even one trout, much less "a lot" of trout, that were bleeding from someone else catching and releasing them. A bleeding trout is one that is not likely to still be feeding.

And if perhaps you're going to say that you barely nicked each of these trout on the lip, I would suggest that maybe they were originally hooked deep but by the time you landed them the hook had come loose and re-hooked the trout in the jaw. Either that or your line got into a vital area, likely behind the gill cover, and sliced the trout during the fight.

 

[Mike]

Trout and other species can bleed from “ the gills” on occasion when hoisted from the water and dangling in air on the end of the line for a moment. It can bee enough force, especially if they are flopping around on the end of the line, to tear or partially tear a gill arch at its base. Tongue hooking will also produce a lot of blood at times. I would expect the gill arch problem to be a rare event.

 

[larkmark]

sending a private message Mike

 

[larkmark]

I suspect another cause....possibly not angler related. Caught all fish on tiny dries. Hooked in jaw. As I said this is something I have seen for several years now on same stream. I think others probably have seen it too.

 

[Mike]

Larkmark,
For some reason pm’s are temporarily not functional for me in terms of responding or creating one .

To which section of the Tully are you referring? This is important because fish in the various sections may have different sources. There may be 2 PFBC hatcheries involved, a cooperative nursery, and escapees from a private hatchery, so knowing specifically where you are finding RT bleeding from the gills is important.

 

[larkmark]

Waterworks

 

[larkmark]

Mike to be clear... This has been happening throughout entire catch and release on rainbows for years now. I am at the point where I always look for it and am actually pleased and surprised when I do not see it. I cannot say I see any dead fish so do not even think it kills them that I know of. I used to think it was related to warm temps as season progresses but obviously that is not case.

 

[Mike]

I guess I can’t help you with that one. There are two sources of RT there...private fingerling stockings and a PFBC hatchery. Nobody prior to this has mentioned it to me in 40 yrs, but with the number of people on this Board who fish there, maybe someone else has seen it.