landing a big fish...

[GonnaCatchABig1]

Originally Posted by numbskull

Keep 'em a rod's length away from you, swing 'em by you, and walk/guide them to shore ahead of you, then walk up to them keeping tension on the rod , grab the leader and get a gill plate.

any advice on the gill plate grab. last one like i said it was goin home any way.. so i just shoved my hand in there with out a care. what sort of approach should i be goin for? i'm thinkin i should be aiming for the bottom of the plate. correct?

i'll just stick to smaller fish (on purpose ) alot easier to lip

[Clogston29]

on bigger fish, don't "thumb" them, grab them with an overhand grip on the jaw, with four fingers in the mouth and the thumb below the jaw. If reqired, put your rod under your arm pit and use two hands to drag them up the rocks. Like mike's grabbing this one.

[Grapenuts]

years ago we had a jetty that was atleast 10' above the water at low and maybe 6 at high..no way were you going to walk anything around or down this one, just to bloody long...so I hit the hardware store and picked up fiberglass extention handle[paint roller kind] that would telle out to 10', close up to 5'...cut the end off and put in a gaff hook that I put into a wood plug that fit inside the pole and put hose clamps around the pole to hold everything in....no lost fish even with large waves wacking the rocks.