The first thing that I would like to clarify is that the first part of this post is only my opinion!

I do not target the post spawn nor the prespawn females during the jig bite. I just go out and jig for walleyes and what ever I catch that is of legal size goes into the cooler as part of my legal creel limit for that particular day. It makes no difference if it is a jack or very large egg laden female which almost never happens.

In the past I had trolled for the large females, unfortunately on one occasion I caught a very large female that was what appeared to be well over 10lbs. I released that fish and as I watched, that fish went belly up on the surface never really getting out of sight. I pulled my lines and went back and repossessed that fish and added that fish to my daily creel limit. Since that time I stopped all catch and release of legal sized walleyes unless forced to release one because of multiple hookups while only needing one more fish to fill my daily creel limit.


I do feel that some of the post(s) on this thread are not quite correct and at least one is almost totally wrong. So! Here is something to think about to apply to the few post that I am talking about!!! I think we will all be able to sort those post out.

Here are some examples/scenarios that could take place on the lake hundreds of times on any given day while fishing for eyes.

While fishing by yourself and needing only one more eye to fill your daily creel limit, would you be limited to just one rod since you only need one fish? Would you be breaking the law if you happened to hook 2 eyes at or about the same time? Would you release the first fish that you brought to the boat if it was an eye not knowing what was actually on the other end of your 2nd rod? If you put the first eye in your cooler making it your final fish to fill your daily creel limit would you then be illegal if you brought in the 2nd fish and it turned out to be an eye even if you released the 2nd fish immediately?

Now if there would be 4 of you and you only need one fish would you limit your group to just one rod or would you continue to fish with 8 rods? If you continued to fish with all 8 rods would that make 3 of you illegal?

I think we all know the answers to the above hypothetical scenarios/questions don't we.

Catch and release means exactly what the phrase implies. Deliberately going out 1,2 or more times in one day and catching and keeping several fish over the daily creel limit is not catch and release but it is exactly what it appears to be! It is over bagging/poaching and it is not, nor is it related to, catch and release.

The ethics involved with catch and release is a personal choice so long as it is within the law as written. If it is done outside the law then it is illegal and no longer a question of personal ethics but is criminal. We all know how honor among theives works don't we?

If a fellow fisherman does not believe in the laws as written and feels there should be a change made, they should lobby the proper agency to change the law which in this case is the ODNR. Chastising those who are following the law does not get the job done but does cause quite a bit of animosity among us fellow fishermen. It is nothing more than preaching to the choir, we all know that does not work don't we?