Question about releasing sharks

[bubbafishin]

I fish from keys bridges every now and again and have caught some 6 ft. bulls and lemons along with lots of nurse sharks and stupid bonnetheads . The main bridge i fish from has a walkway down to the water where i have brought the sharks up by grabbing them by the tail and lifting them onto land and then usually removing the hook or cutting the leader as close as possible. Would it cause less damage to the shark if i just cut the line off broke it off or is it better to to manhandle the thing and get the hook out with pliers? My concern is that all the line and the stinger hook I use might get entangled on the shark before it rusts away if i just break it off and when i pull them out of the water they thrash around like mad, are out of the water and sometimes get a little cut up on rocks on the floor. So if you veteren sharkers could let me know the preffered method it would be greatly appreciated as i like to let big sharks and small sharks free for future generations and all that nice stuff.

P.S. I have not had an unsuccessful release yet i just want too know which way does less long term damage to the fish.

[fixed80]

keep doing what you did before, just cut the line close to the mouth.

[crashmister]

Yea dude you don't want to take them out of the water if possible. The lifting is more harmful than anything else. It causes their internal organs to shift. As long as it's not a stainless hook you can carefully cut the line. Smaller Sharks tend to be harder to hurt but are still vulnerable to injury from a tail lift. Cutting the line is probably a lot easer on your back also.

[bolo]

Use non stainless steel hooks. Cut as much line as possible. The hook will rust out and will not affect their feeding. Smaller sharks I net them and remove the hook.

[TarponKing]

Landing the shark on any ground isnt as good for them....we try to keep the fish in the water or in the wash on the beach.....kinda keep them floating...and its defenitely healthy for the fish cause they basically never really leave the water, and like you said they tend to beat themselves up with thier aggression.......best thing for you if you can cut it close to the hook without getting in the bite zone

after releasing alot of fish like this you will notice the ones that take off better then other times in which you wouldnt have left the fish wet.

heres a good example...

[bubbafishin]

Nice pic Tarpon King, last shark I caught was too heavy for me to lift it was a 6ft. plus bull so I cut all of the wire away and it swam off with just a big ol' hook in its mouth. Now I can sleep easy since the hook probably rusted out already. The smaller sharks are harder for me to control once i get them up because they thrash around like crazy so i will just cut them loose from now on thanks for the info guys.

[TarponKing]

those arc dehookers that are a solid steel pole are awesome and it gets about 70% or so of your hooks out of the fish....also saves you alot of money if your using expensive hooks. and im pretty sure its undestructable i dont really see it breaking...

In the future it would be good for everyone to have one its much safer gettting the hook out of angry fish.

[bubbafishin]

I was actually thinking of buying one of those, last time I was using my pliers to de hook a shark and it thrashed around and yanked the pliers from my hand. After the shark was released I jumped in and got them but anything to get my hand away from those teeth is good.