Anyone out there know if salmon can digest wood? Or at least enough digestive enzyme activity to render it soft enough to pass thru without harming the gut?

I don't know fish, but I do know that people can digest and soften (at least) the soft woods, particularly unfinished product. So who around here knows fish GI ??

I'm looking forward to your followup post. . .the one which tells why you'd ask this interesting question!

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My understanding is that no vertebrates can digest cellulose. Some are able to obtain nutrients from cellulose through the aid of microbes in their digestive systems; think cows. The microbes help the host animal to break down the cellulose.

All the woody like material I have found in the stomachs of trout/steelhead/salmon appear to have been unchanged by any digestive activity. Just one example it is not unusual to find a stick building caddis in a trout's stomach; while the case remained unchanged the larvae inside often appears to have been digested.

Not sure what is the reason behind the question but once ingest salmonids have shown the ability to "pass" some significant items (rocks, etc.).

Curt

Maybe it just passes through. My friend caught a trout that had six inches of mono and a hook with a ball of powerbait on it hanging out it's a hole.

It has everything to do with the wee bitty fish in this pic...



I've adapted the Old Harbor bend I learned in Kodiak back in 2012 into my own signature fNp hangback version. The first bait I put in the water didn't last 5 minutes before being stripped by a Westport king. The first local salmon to succumb to my newfound discovery would end up on LMWS's tag on my next trip out.



Each passing season has seen my confidence in this rigging blossom... to the point that it has become my go-to bait rig. Not just for herring, but also for anchovies. In 2014, it accounted for well over 1200 bites spread over Westport, Buoy 10, and Grays Harbor. Many of those were stripped and there's absolutely no doubt in my mind where the magnum toothpick eventually ended up.

It begs the question as to how much harm I might be inflicting with the hidden surprise within each of those stripped baits. Thoughts of the urban myth of razor blades within Halloween apples comes quickly to mind.... trick or treat?

From a physician perspective, potential threats include secondary bowel obstruction or worse yet bowel perforation with secondary peritonitis.

don't the commercial guys use a bait threader hook set up that uses a lead "wire" to thread the herring or anchovy on? its soft lead so it can be shaped any way you wish and the hook is attached with a wire or mono thru the hollow lead so you never lose the lead. that should solve the issue.

maybe go ask some of the commercial trollers either in Alaska or closer to home where they get them. I know there is a fisheries supply place in Ballard that still sells gear, not sure if they have those or not.

Just a thought. Could you use spinner wire on your leader so that the wire can't be taken? It works fine for prawn spinners.

I heard a similar question at a seminar a couple years ago in regards to prawn spinners and toothpicks for springers. The guide said he hadn't considered it, but he hadn't seen any toothpicks in the fish he kept. I'm not sure how often he looked though.

Sooooooo, the looming question is, how many toothpicks have you found inside the fish you've kept?

Been fishing toothpicks on and off for 18 years in my herring/chovies.

I don't know if a salmon can pass them, but I watched a dude on my boat grab a pre-rigged herring one day and swallow it (like the goldfish swallowing contests in the 50's)!!!

He called poison control and they said he'd pass it in a day or 2. He had it in him for about a week or so, until it perforated his intestine and he "went septic". Nasty scar he ended up with as a souvenir for being stupid. The toothpick was unchanged, just jet black.

Eyefish, I think your concern is a valid one. Some fishermen use bbq skewers for herring rigs. Can't see how those would pass through a fish and not cause the problems you're worried about. Back when chumming was allowed in most lakes, a fisherman told me he found a number of dead trout floating in Lake Wilderness. He said, upon closer inspection, the trout all had obstructed intestines; plugged with whole kernel corn. If fish can't digest corn, there's little chance a large wood "tooth pick" would be altered much while in transit through the gut.

LOL, snit your friend? Same one I had to jump at Cathlamet a few years ago? Hahaa!

Do you find that most of them are hens that swallow the wood?

Roughly 58% are males in the Canal.

Slab...not the same guy, but a mutual acquaintance! I had to lay him out at elk camp a few years ago too...he resides in the "tool" description of acquaintances.

Are you guys talking about redhook?

If you look at the anatomy of a salmon digestive tract, there are several tight hair-pin corners a toothpick would need to navigate in order to successfully make it all the way to the old anal Cheerio. Given the sensitivity people have around here the question of impacts from handling fish and C&R hooking mortality, it would seem like the responsible thing to do by avoiding use of a long and sharp object buried in your bait.

Those salmon are just about to swim up the river and die...and their digestive systems are already turned off, so there's no way they are going to digest the toothpick.

The question is whether or not the toothpick will kill them before they spawn and die...my guess is "no", but that assumes it just hangs in their stomach and does nothing. If it were to poke thru into their belly cavity then I guess that would increase the chances of infection, but that, too, would have to kill them before they die.

Fish on...

Todd

I still can't figure out how trout digest clams, snails and even crawfish. I've caught many with one of those three in them. Yes I did say clams. (Freshwater)

Fixed that for ya, Doc.

I believe it was the Golden Child who brought this to your attention. He's an ass that way.

Here is your solution.

http://www.letsgogreen.biz/pages/ecopicks.html

Not going to worry about it in the bay and river. Plenty of room in an empty gut for a tooth pick. I'll buy you a box of thick spaghetti noodles and sharpen the ends for the salt.
pastabaiters