Bismarck Teen Catches $100 Tagged Fish!

Have you ever caught a tagged fish?  I have, several years ago in South Dakota, but there was no reward that went with it.  I just called in the information and they let me know when the fish was tagged.  Kind of boring, but it gives Game and Fish valuable information on fish movement, mortality and growth rate.  If you hunt ducks and geese, you've maybe seen something similar with banded birds.  I know I shot some banded birds many years ago, but to be honest we didn't even bother to call them in.  It just wasn't a big deal to us at the time.  These days if a hunter's gets a banded bird it's like winning the lottery.

Anyway, over the fourth of July at our lake we go to in Northeast South Dakota my son caught a "tagged" Bluegill.  The funny thing about it, he wasn't even fishing for them.  He was using a "Ned" rig meant for bass, and he landed a nice 8 1/2 inch Bluegill.  He noticed right away it was tagged in "pink" which meant a $100 dollar reward if the fish hadn't been caught before.  So we took a picture of the numbers on the tag, let the fish go,  and entered the numbers in on-line.  A few days later, Fish & Game in South Dakota contacted my son to tell him he was $100 dollars richer, as the fish had not been caught before.  Here's a picture of the fish below.

Lucky kid!  Pretty sure that one hundred dollars will be blown on more fishing equipment.  Anyway, enjoy some more fishing photos from the 4th.