Fish Cleaning Techniques

My Dad is a good fisherman, and although I don't do much of it, I sure enjoy the fish. He's got an excellent method of quickly cleaning fish, and I thought I would outline it for you, maybe it will help on your next fishing adventure, I can tell you it sure helps with lunch! Here's my Dad and son with a nice little Walleye they're about to clean. It seems like a little fish, but on this particular lake the only size you can keep is 12"-18" fish.

Tools of the trade: an electric fish cleaning or carving knife, a Townsend Fish Skinner, a board and some newsprint.

Start where the tail meets the filet and move your knife up along the backbone, you can feel it against the tip if you keep the knife flat.

Continue up till you get to the gill plate, right before the pectoral fin.

Cut down and toward the center of the fish, removing the filet.

Detail of cutting down into the fish.

Make a small cut between the rib bones and the meat, about an inch deep.

Get out your handy dandy Townsend Fish Skinner, but he's not going to remove the skin, the tool is best for the bones, making a boneless filet in one action.

Into your small 1" cut, clamp the bones with the machine.

From there, just roll the bones off all at once!

Run your kife between the skin and filet.

Almost to the end, here's a boneless, skinless filet ready to be washed and cooked.

If you're going to transport the filet, be sure to leave a small patch of skin like above, most states want you to do this to identify the species of fish.

This is kind of an unorthodox method of removing bones, but it's very quick and painless, they can be deboned in literally 5 seconds.

I hope you enjoyed this method, and maybe the next time you're out fishing, cleaning those fish won't be such a chore, and there's nothing better than a fresh pan fried Walleye filet sandwich on a nice dinner roll with a little lettuce and mayo!