In message
,
Giles writes
On Sep 6, 6:11*pm, Todd wrote:
Hi All,

I have caught about 60 trout out of my favorite
river this year. *I have noticed on two trout
this year that I hooked in the lower mouth to
the side of their tongue, that they act completely
normal -- jumping, running, splashing around, dirty
looks -- until I pull my TMC 200BL size 12 barbless
hook out of their mouth.

Then, suddenly, they bleed like hell (a lot of blood),
roll over on their back and act really weird. *I
pushed both of them out of the water with my rod tip.
They manager a little wiggle here and there but
no forward movement. *(They both wound up on my
dinner table.)

Anyone know enough about trout anatomy to say what
is going on here?

The short answer: No.

Did I puncture a main artery
and the hook just kept it plugged?

Maybe. Maybe not.

Did pulling the plug stun them?

Probably not.

Any ideas?

One thing you'd think we would never run short of here. The problem
is that there are really only half a dozen or so (and 95% of those are
undeniably bad) that are continuously recycled in various transparent
guises.

It is better than gut hooking the other 58 with
bait,

Depends on the intended goal.

but I am a bit puzzled.

Knowing that puts you far ahead of the vast majority of your erstwhile
tutors.

Maybe the Lord
wants me to eat a few of them every so often.

You'll have to ask the Lord.....or her spokespersons.....about that.

He did make them awfully yummy after all.

She didn't make them at all, after all. She just has some effective
press agents.....which is to say that she has an acutely credulous
audience.

Many thanks,

You're welcome.

Meanwhile, a couple of points which may or may not be worth
considering. First, fish don't have fingers.....or none that anyone
has noticed and reported in the scientific literature thus far,
anyway. Visual, auditory and olfactory equipment are fairly standard
(insofar as we can assume they are correctly identified and
understood) for vertebrates. Likewise, tactile gear presents no
obvious and immediately observable surprises. The simple fact is that
once fish have discovered a foodlike substance, or what appears to be
such, final confirmation.....or rejection.....would appear to depend
on what we can call, for simplicity's sake, tactile and flavor
receptors in, on, and around the tongue. I, for one, would not be
much surprised if this correlated with a high degree of
vascularization and ennervation in and around the region of the tongue
(for reasons that should be immediately obvious to anyone who feels
even remotely qualified to consider such issues.....let alone hold
forth on them). Thus, it would also be no surprise if a sharp steel
barb penetrating membranes in this region caused a good deal of
distress.....and bleeding. Beyond that, it wouldn't be quiet accurate
(or even marginally so) to say that anyone's guess is as good as
anyone else's......but it would certainly be fair to say that most
would be just as puerile as most others.

That said, I'd guess that exhaustion (however one cares to define it)
plays a larger role in the behavior of fish immediately after the kind
of struggle entailed in trying to escape after being hooked than does
bleeding. In the long run, bleeding MAY be a greater cause of
mortality than other physiological stresses or damage but.....nobody
here (or anywhere else, I suspect) knows.

Others may disagree. In fact, many will. That's all well and good.
It is, in fact, the way things should be. However, it pays to
remember that where Usenet is concerned, most of those others will be
ignorant (not only in terms of the matters under consideration here,
but also in general), uninterested in discussion (not to mention being
bereft of any idea of what discussion entails), and phenomenally
stupid. All of which can easily be understood if one remembers that
they come here primarily to find someone to hate more than they do
themselves......which, naturally, causes them perpetual consternation.

In any case, the fish die.....or they don't. If you're really
interested in which is the more likely outcome.....and why.....you're
going to have to get yourself something a whole lot better than a mere
PhD in icthyology.

g.

In short (if you know what that means) - you don't know the answer to
his question!
--
Bill Grey