How do You store caught fish at sea?

[TelStar26]

Im planning a full 12+Hour day on the water this week and starting thinking about the fish in the fish box that were cought (hopefully! ) early in the morning. Sitting in a cooler in 20degree weather allll day. Do you guys just buy ice for the box? Or is there other options?

 

[Barnacle Bill]

Bleed them, put in cooler with jel packs or ice. No cooler, bleed them, then cover with wet cloth or towel, and keep wetting the cloth thru out the day. ..............BB

 

[spring time]

I freeze a milk jug of water then put it in a cooler that's what I do

 

[tyeegalore]

Bleed and ice in the fish box. When fishing is slow I clean the fish and back into the box on ice.

 

[capt hook]

bacteria build up starts immediately after rigor mortise.
get the fish cleaned and bled and in a cold cooler asap.
getting it as cold as possible as soon as possible slows the breakdown immensely.

when i trolled commercially we would take 3 tons of flake ice in a insulated hold ,
handleing hundreds of fish a day was a challenge of being organised and ready.
we layered then and stuffed bellies with ice. and 4 inches of top coat ice to finish of a pen.
gut , clean , and get em down asap was the trick to being able to stay out for 10-12 days and deliver a awesome product.
if left out after rigor , it would be cat food.

 

[TelStar26]

Thanks Guys! ill freeze up a couple small pales for the ice, and bleed em. If We catch them super early ill consider cleaning them as well.
Thanks guys!

 

[capt hook]

Thanks Guys! ill freeze up a couple small pales for the ice, and bleed em. If We catch them super early ill consider cleaning them as well.
Thanks guys!

Are you kidding me?
consider cleaning them?
as soon as it stops flopping about , take gills and guts and blood line out and into the ice.
get organized and do it and you will have the best product.

 

[sir-vivor]

I IMMEDIATELY clean them ( gutted, gills and bloodlined) the I pit them in live well filled with sea water l flushing them with sea every so often and they are fresh as can be 7-8 hours no problem

 

[bcboy]

For me, as soon as the gear is back in the water, the fish are gilled, gutted, scraped clean and then iced, belly, head and a little top ice. I am a firm believer of getting the core temp down right away, keeps em nice!
The only exception is rock fish, don't bonk, just put them on ice and fillet them the next day, filleting to early leaves the fillets bloody.

 

[Jencourt]

Our fish are bled right away. Lines go back in and then fish is cleaned and in ice within a few short minutes. A couple pails of ice seems to be too little. We have a large white igloo half full of ice ready for the fish.

 

[eaglemaniac]

Hey bcboy... How do you put a live rockfish on ice?

 

[bcboy]

Hey bcboy... How do you put a live rockfish on ice?

Lift the lid of the cooler, put the rockfish on the ice and close the lid

Edit, the theory, so I've been told is that letting them die on their own is that the blood will come out of the meat and accumulate in the latch of the fish and by leaving them firm up and chill before filleting makes for beautiful white fillets

 

[TelStar26]

Ok, I get the picture..Bleed and De-Gut right away.
Thanks Guys!

 

[Cuba Libre]

Bleed rockies immediately just like you do other species. Rip or cut the gills out. That is the ONLY way to get white fillets. (and DONT leave them with thier guts in....)

 

[Sharphooks]

If belly-icing or flake-icing cleaned fish, put the cooler up on a small block of wood so one end sits approx. 3" to 5" off the deck and open the drain so it flows into your bilge. Bacteria is reduced if you get the ice-melt out of your cooler.

A slick trick I learned on this Site--- freeze water up in smaller bottles (like empty screw-cap Coke or water bottles) and load them in your cooler prior to fishing. This drops the temp down of the cooler before fish get in there, then once you get your groceries, place them in the belly cavities of each fish. Works as a good substitute for flake-ice or salt ice if you don't have any; works extremely well to drop the temp of your fish even if you do have ice

IF you can't clean your fish right away for one reason or another, at the very least slit their throats so you get the gill-filaments ---the knife blade goes in one gill plate opening (under the throat isthmus) then out the other gill plate opening, then bring the blade up through the isthmus---a bled fish produces less bacteria and better fillets.

 

[RookieFisherPerson]

Does anybody use an ice slurry in their coolers? I saw this done on a charter. The cooler/hold is filled with salt ice. Then some salt water is added to make a slurry. This quickly lowers the temperature of the fish placed in the slurry solution.

 

[Hook'Em Hard]

I guess I'm a redneck. I bleed em then throw em in the exposed transom for the rest of the day. Yea sometimes the sun beats on them - what can ya do when you have a small boat? I clean the fish when I return to the dock which could be 2 hours or it could be 14 hours depending on the day.

I do scoop sea water with the **** jug and dump it on the fish throughout the day. It keeps them a little cool and maybe adds some nice flavor?

I use no ice, no cooler, and I don't clean them right away (the line up at the cleaning station most afternoons during the summer suggests most people wait to clean the fish too).

Don't do what I do but the suggestion by a few that the fish need to be cleaned within 5 minutes of being caught is unreasonable and unrealistic.

 

[casper5280]

I do scoop sea water with the **** jug and dump it on the fish throughout the day. It keeps them a little cool and maybe adds some nice flavor?

Sorry but I won't be able to make it to your Salmon bar-b-cue this weekend.

 

[Sangster21]

I would like to rig up an on board fish cleaning station, any one have some pics or ideas that work well for them? I think a v shaped trough would help out for gutting on a moving boat.
Alan

 

[wildwest]

Capt hook is right, the commy's do it for a living,same as the troller I worked on.