According to TPWD, as I read it, it appears that someone can catch multiple limits of game fish a day by catching a limit of fish then go home (permanent residence) put the fish in their freezer, then head back to the creek or lake to fish again... Anyone else has a different interpretations? (see TPWD definitions below):


Here's quick copy & past from TPWD, 2 definitions in particular:

Daily Bag: Quantity of a species of a wildlife resource, such as fish, that may be taken in one day.

Day: A 24-hour period of time that begins at midnight and ends at midnight.

...

Permanent Residence: One's principal or ordinary home or dwelling place. This does not include one's temporary abode or dwelling such as a hunting/fishing club, or any club house, cabin, tent, car, truck, or trailer house used as a hunting/fishing club, or any hotel, motel, or rooming house used during a hunting, fishing, pleasure, or business trip.

Possession Limit: The maximum number of fish a person may possess before returning to their permanent residence. Possession limit is twice the daily bag on game and nongame fish, except as provided in this guide, and does not apply to fish in the possession of or stored by a person at their permanent residence.

UPDATE:
I did call the TPWD - Fort Worth � 817-831-3128, talked to a lady who talked to a game warden and she said and I paraphrase her: "that is the law, one bag limit per 24 hours day." (notice, each 24 hours day begins at midnight and ends at midnight)

So don't break the law, keep only 5 hybrids per 24 hours day. It's NOT worth the risk of getting ticket over a few fish!

However, when I asked about the definition of the "Possession Limit", her tone changed, I didn't get the specific answer on it, and didn't feel comfortable to continue the question, just thanked her and hanged up. I did called the Garland TPWD office and asked to speak to a game warden, but none was in the office and the lady did try to help, so I put the same question to her and read the "Possession Limit" to her. She then gave me the Austin 1-800-972-1112. I called, get a recording...

To summarize, what I gathered from this brief experience, IT IS NOT WORTH THE RISK OVER A FEW FISH. JUST STICK WITH 5 HYBRIDS PER 24 HOURS DAY.

No. Possession limit is not the daily bag limit.

A daily bag limit is a 24 hour period from midnight to midnight. You can possess a double bag if you are not at your permanent residence and provided you did not bag them in the same midnight to midnight day. But you could fish from 10 pm to 6 am and that would be treated as two days. You can't be fishing at 12:01 am and after with more than 1 bag.

Who would know if you went home and put your fish in the freezer and return for more? This will be very difficult to track. I'm sure people live near the lake are doing this and no one knows. My two cents.

+1, the regulation is also very clear that you can not possess more than 2 bag limits if you fish more than 2 days. This possession limits applies to you while you are at the water or camp and before you return to your permanent residence (home). But if you return home and store/clean your fish, you can go fishing again and fill your bag limit or possession limit anew because the game wardens cannot count your fish stored at your home as part of your possession. (the underlined wording are actually incorrect, you'd go over your daily bag limit and might get a ticket, so stay home until the clock ticks past midnight, then start your new day. Also, read further discussion on this further down this thread toward the end to get more details...)

Few people will go back once they get home, not worth the gas or isn't as much fun as first time around... unless, you live near a fishing water body, e.g. Rowlett Creek, and you like to stock up the fish so bad... then of course there's an issue of moral/ethic vis-a-vis wastefulness of public resource.

Just want those who need the fish more than others to know their rights that they can go back to catch some more fish for their family if truly needed, especially if they don't have the means to catch fish in the other 9 months out of the year. Just don't waste our valuable public resource... Catch what you'll eat, and eat all that you catch. Also, remember IT IS ILLEGAL TO SELL FISH THAT YOU CATCH.

Ren, just to restate what bass junkie said - you cannot bag more than the limit in the respective 24 hour period whether you take it home - I do not believe the bag limit resets just because you took them home - the bag limit only resets when the clock hits midnight. This is a good discussion- thanks for starting it - I wish this site had a "Ask the Warden" thread such as other sites do and get responses directly from the TPWD.

Not so, according to the letters of TPWD regulations (as I understand it), when you're back at the water (or fishing camp), with your empty cooler, you possess zero fish and start counting again from there. See the definitions below:

Permanent Residence: One's principal or ordinary home or dwelling place. This does not include one's temporary abode or dwelling such as a hunting/fishing club, or any club house, cabin, tent, car, truck, or trailer house used as a hunting/fishing club, or any hotel, motel, or rooming house used during a hunting, fishing, pleasure, or business trip.

Possession Limit: The maximum number of fish a person may possess before returning to their permanent residence. Possession limit is twice the daily bag on game and nongame fish, except as provided in this guide, and does not apply to fish in the possession of or stored by a person at their permanent residence.

The possession limit may reset....but not the bag limit. To catch and retain 2 bag limits during a midnight to midnight period violates the bag limit law. Obviously, this relies a lot on the morality of the angler as it may hard to prove if an angler is taking a limit home and then taking another limit in that same "day" but by law, only 1 bag limit/day.

I just verified this with the FTW office of TPWD to ensure my interpretation was correct. They agreed. Ren, I'm not trying to call you out, I just want everyone to properly understand the law and I agree that the interpretation can get a bit confusing at times. I encourage anyone who is unsure to get validation directly from the TPWD or a Warden and not rely on internet interpretations (including myself).

Note - the TPWD did say it was not uncommon for wardens to get calls from anglers who observed a person who limited out and then saw them keeping fish again later in the day. It does happen and wardens can respond to such situations.

If you want the fish bad enough, and don't want to break the Daily Bag regulation (see below)

Daily Bag: Quantity of a species of a wildlife resource, such as fish, that may be taken in one day.

Day: A 24-hour period of time that begins at midnight and ends at midnight.

Bring a camera that store the date and time on the picture. Let's say you start fishing at 10pm on Wed night, and you caught 3 hybrids before midnight, took a pic of each fish before and after you put them on your stringer. Do the same with your next 5 hybrids that you catch after midnight on Thursday AM hours. Do not rearrange your fish on the stringer, stringer them in the order that you caught. Go home after the eighth fish in your possession. If you're checked by a game warden, show him/her the pics on your camera/phone, and show him your stringer. Once you store your fish at your permanent residence (home), you can go back fishing again if you choose to and catch another 5 hybrids. Once the fish are stored at your residence, you can not sell your fish (it's illegal), but you can give them away to your relatives or neighbors.

Know your rights, stand your ground, but don't waste or abuse our public resources. Don't break the laws, catch what you eat, and eat all you caught. REMEMBER, THE LAWS ARE WRITTEN BY MEN/WOMEN, THEY CAN BE CHANGED BY MEN/WOMEN IF NEEDED TO OR WHEN THE FISHERY DECLINE SIGNIFICANTLY...

In your example, you are ok with having 8 fish in possession if 3 were caught on Wed and 5 on Thursday using the TPWD definition of a "day" - again, you will need to convince the Warden this was the case. However, if you go out on Thursday again to catch another limit, you are in violation. You can verify this with the TPWD - Fort Worth � 817-831-3128.

First, I get checked by game wardens at least once or twice a year. I'm one of those people who are happy to see game wardens going in force doing there jobs to protect our fisheries... Coincidentally, I never caught a limit any species of fish, period. That's because I tend to catch a mixed bag of bigger fish, and my cooler get full and I stop fishing... I practice what I said.

Secondly, you're correct that every one should check the regulation from TPWD aughority themselves, and should not rely on lay person (including myself), just to avoid misinterpretation of the regulation letters.

now... Let's discuss your points
"The possession limit may reset....but not the bag limit. " that is absolutely true, e.g. for hybrids, the "daily bag limit" is always five fish. But what I'm saying (as I understand it) is that the game wardens can only check on you base on your possession limits while you're out fishing or at your camp... By saying the possession limit may reset means that you can catch the "daily bag" of five hybrids (which is unchanged, i.e. it is same limit of five fish in your possession within a 24 hrs period)... But the game wardens cannot count the fish that you already stored at your permanent residents. It might have something to do with privacy law or degree of difficulty of determining the ages of the fish in the freezer or simply the laws wasn't written to absolutely preventing everyone from catching 5 hybrids a day, but rather to make it difficult enough to deter a greater number of fishermen to take fish out of water. From a fishery management perspective, it isn't the magic number 5 that does the tricks, its the totality of all the fish taken out of the water that matter.

Personally, I think the regulation is good enough from a fishery point of view. For example, people like me who work 6 days/week and with two school age boys, I would be lucky if I can get out a fish for a few hours/week. Plus, my wife already complaining about my gas money that I spend to/from the lake. For 99% of people, we don't have the time or money to go fishing twice/day.

And that's how the "Daily Bag" and "Possession Limits" work, and they works wonderfully in our economy.

I'm glad that someone posted the definition of day because I was reading a different interpretation of "day" on another post. In that post, a day was described as a 24 hour period since your last limit.

On the example above, it looks like you can technically have 10 hybrids on an overnight trip as long as you caught 5 before midnight and 5 after midnight based on the definition of day provided by TPWD. I can see that it's going to be hard sell if a warden sees you with 10 fish the next morning. My opportunities to fish are hard to come by so I don't see this scenario affecting me, but I am curious if anyone has had this discussion with a warden before.

Ren, the point is making sure people don't believe the daily bag limit resets just because you took them to your primary residence (as you said). Your prior posts leads me to believe you think you can take more than 1 bag limit just because you got them home. That is not true. 1 bag limit/day. Period.

Not trying to bust on you.......I just don't want people to be caught because they thought what they were doing was legal by bad information/interpretation.

Ren, you gotta stop with this because you're going to get a lot of people (whether new to fishing and looking for info, or just ignorant of the laws) in trouble.

This came directly from a game warden today: "In no way can you ever catch and keep more than one bag limit per species in a day. Possession limit and daily bag limit are two very different things and the daily bag limit DOES NOT reset regardless of bringing the resource back to your residence. You will absolutely get a ticket for "over the limit" if you catch a limit in the morning and take another limit in the evening even though you took your morning limit back home."

The possession limit was instituted so that we fishermen could take a multi-day fishing trip and be able to come back with two days worth of fish instead of just one (if we so chose), since we weren't able to take them home in between fishing events. This is a privilege and can be taken away if people start illegally taking advantage of it, so let's try to limit the amount of mis-information out there.

"But the game wardens cannot count the fish that you already stored at your permanent residents"

They absolutely can. If they get a call from a fisherman that says you caught what appeared to be a limit that morning, and the wardens see you out there with almost another limit in the afternoon, they most certainly will count the ones you say supposedly don't count anymore since they are at your permanent residence. Believe me, the search warrants on your house and stacks of citations and civil restitution per fish is not worth the chance of bringing home a couple more fish (illegally), and it's definitely not something you should be suggesting to other people who otherwise would not have thought of doing something illegal.