The reason cleaning fish on the water is illegal is because of illegal harvest. How is the GW to know how many fish you cleaned, if they were of legal size and when they were caught? Verifying length limit, bag limit and possession limit can't be done if the fish have been cleaned before you reach shore.

Actually when I mention trash, I take the guts home in a trash bag I carry with me.
I throw the dead fish away at home.

Yeah it is easier to know how many fish you cleaned, if they were legal size and when they were caught if you cleaned them at the boat ramp. I can look at a filet cleaned at the ramp and tell whether or not the fish was legal, but one cleaned on the water I can't................

GMB

The minnow bucket at Lake Fork also has a cleaning station on the water, with plenty of turtles at the ready to take care or your waste parts.

Think about it just a couple of seconds. If you are cleaning fish at the ramp, you would have a carcass. Cleaned on the water, no carcass and no way to tell what kind of fish or the size.

Them boys in Oklahoma are pretty bad spellers, reckon ?

"Back before the Golden Algae outbreak on Possum Kingdom, Fox Hollow used to have 2 fish cleaning stations on their dock. I do know how may pounds of fish were cleaned there by folks but I know I used it a ton. Those old nasty Striper's and Sand Bass were good table fare and it made more room for the Black Bass. As a matter of fact, that pier was a natural fish attractant because of all bones. It was one of my better spots to catch Black Bass."

And I agree with ChuChu1's post above as well. This part of why I am contributing to this conversation.


I recall getting ready to go fishing one summer morning listening to 820 AM in Dallas about 6 AM, about 2 or 3 years ago, they had a gentleman on that lived in Seattle or there abouts and was an ex or current pro fisherman that had gotten involved in trying to bring the Salmon population back and they had worked for more than 10 years on it and they had found the best thing they could do was to artificially introduce fish scraps up stream in the rivers to improve the overall population. At first Salmon scraps and then they found it did not matter what species of fish it was as they went along, as long as there was decaying fish material in the streams it fed the ecosystem or circle of life that fed the baby salmon headed to the ocean.
When the host asked him where he got the scraps. I really thought it was interesting when he said that all the restaurants in the area were the ones contributing the fish scraps. I thought Wow! That is the ultimate recycling.
Any ways I thought this would add to this conversation and from this one interview I agree the best place other than a garden is in the lake or some other moving body of water. And I think from this statement �If you talk to TP&W, fish in the trash can is illegal.� above that the TPWD understands this and I might add is a very heads up organization in this area when it comes to wildlife management.

Oops! I just noticed I had not flipped to page 2 of this conversation. Here it is any way before I finish reading all comments.

So I take a fish home and clean it who is to know, but me what size that fish was except for me. If I clean it at a fish cleaning station the hole world can know.

You do know that game wardens check fish at the ramp don't you? Then HE will know.