I got a big native steelhead last week and was thinking it would have have been nice to get an actual weight on it. I thought for sure I'd broken the 20lbs barrier based on pictures I've seen of other fish that purported to be over 20lbs.

I took its measurements, 36.5x20 and it only came out to 18.83lbs. Anyway way this got me thinking of how I could get an actual weight without hurting the fish.

I remember I'd seen pictures of cradle nets and this looked like a kind of promising way to do it. You could just slip it under the fish, attach the scale to the net, give a quick lift and get a weight (subtracting out the net). The fish would be supported for its full length and couldn't thrash around for the short time it was out of the water.

What do you think?

Here is a link showing a cradle net.

cradle net