5/16/2008

Fast Tips

"No Time for Slime"

Fish slime is an alert secretion

Timothy Kusherets

Every single anadromous fish that has been touched exuded “slime”. In this photo, I'm holding a native salmon that makes it very difficult to touch due to slime. It's slippery, gooey, and is dripping with slime too gross for some women and girls. Fish that excrete this much slime need to be handled carefully and quickly if you intend to release it. As soon as this photo was snapped off I released it back into the estuary, near the mouth of a river, where it was caught. Remember, slime is an alert secretion that can put other fish off the bite, so when releasing fish make sure to do it “down current” from where it was caught if you intend to keep on fishing. Not taking this precaution can put an entire school of fish off the bite or chase them from the area entirely.

Fish communicate to each other with chemical, visual, and auditory signals. Each of these forms of communication can put fish on or off the bite in an instant. The one thing that almost all anglers have in common when fishing is the slime felt when grabbing any portion of a caught fish. Fish slime is an alert secretion that lets entire schools of fish know that danger is in the area. When putting fish back in the water make sure to do it downstream from where the fish was landed. Anglers fishing in saltwater can do the same by putting their catches back down current from where fish were initially hooked into.
Before going back to fish, take the time to dip slime-coated hands in the water and wash off the film as best you can, then dry off by brushing them onto waders, shirts, or screaming wives. This little bit of info will keep fish on the bite. But, after wiping slime onto your wife its best not to turn your back on her.