BigBendFishing.Net

i was watching the "ifa redfish tour" last night and they made mention that fl. had a no cull law on redfish, i had never heard this so i called the fl. fish and game and they confirmed this to be true. I was told that that once you put a redfish in your livewell it was against the law to release him for a bigger one. They did say there were exceptions to tournaments if a request was made and granted in writing for that tournament. I know i am from ga so my question is this, Is this no cull law common knowledge ?

Spot on

Common knowledge, I'd bet more know about it than are willing to admit.
Commonly heeded & followed, again in most cases probably not.

I don't see why you would want to cull any fish to start with. If you catch a 19" redfish, but you need a 25" redfish for dinner, throw the 19" back and catch a 25" one. If all you need for dinner is a 19" redfish, and you catch a 19" redfish, throw him in the cooler and call the rest of the day catch and release.

In a tournament if you catch a 25" red,you have a tough decision to make. Keep it and hope it is good enough or let it swim and hope for a larger slot fish. Now that the limit is 2 per person, it is less of an issue. But technically once you have your limit, another fish in the net is considered possession. It is a question asked by the lie detector man during tournaments.

You can not cull legally any fish in saltwater...the IFA requests a cull permit from the FWC and that permit is given to the anglers during check in. The cull permit is written for certain counties - the last one I fished in they had forgot to add Franklin county - so we had to decide with each fish if we wanted to keep it or not...first fish was 5.5 lbs...think about throwing that one back - like rolling the dice.

They didn't ask that during the lie detector for me - asked if we used bait, penned fish or drank beer...which is not allowed.

Chalk wrote: They didn't ask that during the lie detector for me - asked if we used bait, penned fish or drank beer...which is not allowed.

So you just stuck with the Jack Daniels?

Just as a side note to what chalk is saying about the ifa, the tournament Iwas watching was out of gulfshores al. and the boat they were filming had made the run to fl. to fish, so i assume that is why they did not have a cull permit for this tournament. I just asked because I had never heard of this or seen it on any tournament rules, which I assume it is covered by saying all statelaws apply. Thanks for the feedback

They did not get Florida cull permits for an Alabama tournament...it is somewhat a moot point in Ala too...they can keep more reds. FWC probably wouldn't issue them either for an out of state event.

Thanks guys. You taught us boys something we did not know, many redfish later. Not that we don't release more than our share, just surprised this never came to our attention before now.

SYNONYM n. chalk....penned fish....beer