I haven't weighed a fish in years.
Handling fish is usually the kiss of death. You still see pics in the magazines where fish are held vertically by their gills. Doing this almost always damages the spine and spinal cord.
In some pics the fish is held in a position where the hand is in the gills but hidden from the camera. And how about those bass fishermen who hold the fish vertically out of water by the bottom jaw?
If you intend to release a fish you need to retrieve it immediately. Limit the fight to as short a time as possible. This usually means using a heavier rod and line. Fish that are fought to exhaustion and then released have high mortality.
There is good research on catch and release. It is not the benign activity the C&R proponents would have you believe.
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