what the hell is a spiny ray?

i've heard this term thrown out there a couple of times, is it a fish, or like a subspecies or what??

Walleye are, I think they are fish with spines on the dorsal???

Uh oh.. Mark's out to set another state record...

cfish has it correct, spiny rays are such fish as perch, bass, bluegill, walleye, don't know about crappie, but i'm guessing them too!!!

damn bird you caught me...lol not really, but actually last year i did compile a list of about 7-8 fish that i deemed have beatable records i put a star next to 3 or 4 that im pretty sure i have already beat...lol

chris/cfish thanks for the clarification

Yea more or less s**tfish..For the most part...

Walleye and Crappie are sh!tfish, have u ever eaten any?????

Keywords: "For the most part"

Yes I do respect Walleye and Bass.
I can't say anything about Crappie as I've never fished for em or tasted them, but Walleye are tasty.

C'mon if they don't flash silver they aren't worth playing with...

Heck if you're going to eat a walleye you might as well eat a squawfish..... No really, why wouldn't a squawfish taste any good? They eat the same stuff as a Walleye...

Keith

LOL those s**tfish will be what's left for us to fish for in a few years.

BTW Bass are considered "spinyrays" too.

Spiney Rae was an underweight crack 'Ho I use to hang out with on the South side of Chicago. She's kinda gamey, kinda fishey, but not a game fish.

Always wear protection before touching a Spiney Rae.


VHawk

LMFAO!!!

VHawk: Your starting to talk like Sol, lol.

Cheapskate: Yea I know bass are spiny ray as well

Stlhdr1: Squawfish tend to have ridicolously high PCB and Mercury levels...they are like the bullhead of freshwater. Walleye are actually good tasting. I don't know of anyone who's ever tried squawfish.

spiny ray: underrated, good eating fish that few people fish for on the west side.

i don't know what i like better, springer fillets or a plate full of deep fried bass/bluegill/perch/walleye/crappie.

plus, you don't get an angry mob after you for killing one, unless there's a diehard bass fishermen around. then i just give them the finger when i lift up my stringer.

hey vince did she have a sister snoty leggs

Get off your soap boxes. Warm water fish are fun stuff. Crappie are my favorite. I have caught "multiple" steelhead over 20 lbs.. more than several, but I would trade one for a 17 inch crappie.. I have gotten close. 15 1/2 and 16, but never hit that "holy grail" of 17 inches. The weather is usually good, and its a great family outing. Kids love it because at times, you can catch one every cast. Along the way, we catch Small mouth bass. Those suckers are big fun on an ultra lite set up. Some of the lakes real close are world class ( Brownlee, Oxbow, Hells Canyon, CJ Strike) for smallies and Crappie.

A good freind of mine is a professional Bass fisherman ( Fishes the FLW tour ) and does pretty well. True enough, he looks like Ricky Bobby out there, but trust me, his life does not suck ( when was the last time a sponcer gave you 20,000 dollars worth of whatever you thought you needed and a 50,000 dollar boat to go out and use it.. every year..) His wife used to be pretty skeptical of the whole thing " why don't you just get a job" but these days, when he brings home the bacon its 5 digits on the check.

I'll go out with him a couple times a year when he is home. I love a drift boat, however, If you have ever been in Triton that can top 70 MPH you know how freaking scary it is. Those things flat fly. He will have 6 different rods rigged and fishes like he is mad at those fish. No wasted movement. You think you can cast a level wind ?? Guy can take you to school. He can hop a bait under any tree limb. Its pretty impressive. He does crack me up. He will be fishing bass and I'll be fishing crappie. Many, many times the big bass of the day falls to my crappie jig. He gets every kind of pissed. " I need you to help me pattern these fish" " Uhhh, dude, I think I just did. You want a chartruse crappie jig " " STFU, and start throwing this Motor oil brown sparkle wiggling hoggie wog, or I'm gonna throw your ass off this boat "..

It ain't steelhead, but it does pass the time and its pretty fun.

you are grossin me out. Springer? there is no comparison. you must have not grown up around here boiy!!

oh yeah....theres nothin like eaten a nice mushy, mud tastin, pale meated lake fish mmmmm mmmmm gosh. just cant wait to go out and get them : )

it just cracks me up when i get into these diehard 50,000 metallic gold boats with billy bob sittin up front, bouts to catch em some bass!! they get all pissy when i laugh at using 25lbs test for a fish that generalyl is under 10 lbs. seems kinda....unsportsman like. plus i read the article of the guy who caught this ginormous bass, thing looked like it was at the powerplant lake or somethin

" well she bit hard, ran a bit , almost took me about 3 minutes to get her in."


3 minutes?

ive had 8 lbs steelhead last more than 3 minutes. let alone a 20 lbs.

lake fishin is fun dont get me wrong, but for taste and exhiliration, keep me on the salt, or the river.

That was funny.

We need a Pro Steelheaders Tour. Oh crap, what the hell am I talking about. The egos are big enough around here. They don't need to swell any more than they are!

Spiney rays are the "nappy headed ho's" of the fish world...

B-RUN.... Was fishing up in the Boundary Waters of Northern Minnesota 'bout 12 years back.... Got into bunches of huge crappie... caught them on spoons and stuff I was casting for northerm pike and smallmouth. They seemed to be hanging out with the big boys and feeding on the same forage.... All the crappie were over 2 pounds and probably 17 inches or more........

Thought it was an aberration but when I got back to Ely and related the story at one of the tackle shops I was told that huge crappie in these lakes are very common.....

These Crappie were huge but they didn't taste very good.... smaller ones are excellent table fare but these big boys had a lot of dark fatty stuff in the fillets....

An interesting note for anyone who might have an opportunity to head back and fish northern minnesota at any time in the future.... Fishing is very popular in this state but everyone is after walleye for the frying pan.....

The tackle shops in Ely all have large quantities of leeches and minnows in live wells....... These baits tend to favor catching walleye over smallmouth bass or northern pike and that's where everyone's head is at.........

I don't like using bait (especially live bait) so I just started throwing out spoons and crankbaits and was hauling in all these northern pike, bass, and huge crappie while everyone else in the party drowned leeches and caught nothing.....

Crappie and Walleye in my opinion fair better than halibut or lings, the only saltwater bottomfish that can compare is a yelloweye and i've only eaten them when i go to alaska! Tons of flavor!

There are two kinds of fishermen, those who fish for spiny rays and those that dont. I once bass fished, i bet 20 or so years ago. Big 20 second fight, then just drag them in on the surface......Just could not get into it

A 4 pound smallie on light spinning tackle with just a small grub on the end is a pretty good time. Better yet, poppers on the bug rod.

Largemouth on the other hand...... 20 pound test on a salmon jigging rod just doesn't quite do it for me.

Having grown up in the midwest, I have a natural connection with spiny ray fish'n and eatin. After spending fifteen years in the northwest, I have made the connection with the cold water species. If your looking for the challenge of spiny ray fishing you just have to match the equipment to the fish like has mentioned in the previous posts. Catching a bucket full of bluegill or perch is just as exiting as catching 2 springers. Drinkin beer and filleting a bucket full of perch is a party back in Michigan. Then deep frying those boneless and skinless fillets and serve them with more beer and potatoes is a tasty treat, IMO.

Bass was a numbers game for me as I didn't think they fought well. It was always about how many I could trick and get to the boat.

Spiny ray = Any fish you can pick up by the mouth, wave in front of a camera, throw 10 ft end over end back into the water, and not get flamed here.

Its been said pound for pound small mouth can be one of the toughest fighting fish. Its all about the set up your cathing them on. Light line and a 6' 6" medium pole gets the job done. Why would you use salmon gear for large mouth i use the same set up for both largies and smallies. You will never no untill you try. For the guys that dont like them thanks less pressure for me.

if i had a quality smallmouth lake close by i wouldn't be as much of a hardcore steelhead fisherman. they don't taste half bad either.

Lake Washington is a quality smallie lake...

I can do that with a spoogin buck steely from off of Tbird line, so it must be a spiny ray! lmao

Lake Erie is a quality smallie lake Fish hunter.... Lake Washington is a big deep western washington lake with a few smallmouth bass residing within it's boundaries....

Western washington sporties should feel lucky that they have the kind of anadromous sport fishing opportunities that they have... no question that the pursuit of sea run trout and salmon here far exceeds the kind of sport fishing opportunity offered by spiny ray fish like smallmouth bass and walleye in eastern and midwestern states...........

but, when there are no steelhead and there are no chinook a man has to fish for something and that, more often than not, ends up being spiny ray species such as bass and walleye....

Most of us western washington sporties DO fell lucky to have the opportunity to fish for steelies and salmon.. Thats the biggest reason most of us would rather live here.....

i'd rather live in the great lakes, more steelhead and salmon, plus nobody will bust your chops for whacking one over the head.

and the best part is if they're not cooperating, you can switch gear and try for a walleye in a few of those rivers

Chum man makes a good point. When I fished Lake Erie and Lake ontario on a regular basis about 2 decades ago the limit was 5 (trout and salmon in combination) and you didn't have to punch the stupid punchcard....

Only problem with Great Lakes salmonoids, except for the lake trout, is that the fresh water doesn't do much for the flavor.... probably ok to smoke but for the table I used to target walleye and lake trout........

I terms of pure red meated fish eating heaven i don't think anything beats a 6 to 8 pound winter blackmouth caught in the cold deep waters of puget sound where they are gorging on calmari......... but any salmon caught in the saltchuck or fresh from the saltchuck and not too dark yet is going to be much, much better tasting than the one you get in the great lakes...

Yea but those salmon are just loaded with mercury and PCB levels...

I fish for bass also in some smaller tournaments... Lake Wa is a kick in the pants...i love to fish for smallmouth...i fish for everything...i really was pretty depressed for a while after the North of Falcon meetings this year, (I lost a month of fishing in a area that i fish at lunch) but anyway...i really let my bass club freind rip when i had a few drinks and told em "all you guys will give a crap about the salmon and steelhead in this state when there are no more and we turn to YOUR precious litlle lakes and start fishing for Largies and Smallies"....they wernt too happy with me...but a few of em said that they would help me try to protect the salt and some rivers if they could...I took it pretty hard after i found out about next years rule changes...but hey...this is the first time that i will ever be able to fish for Summer Kings in area 9 and 10 and be able to keep one!! c