Other ponds in NW OH are in the mid to higher 40F range. A guy dipped out the first group of struggling tilapia (blues) today - water 47F. He cleaned them and said they were okay. He scaled and gutted them with plans to put them in his meat smoker. When water is in the mid 40's and fish are dead, I think they would be okay to clean and eat providing the fish still have a little body color and meat is not getting soft. I've cleaned fish that had been on ice for 20 hours and they were fine. We used to bring back gutted fish from Canada on ice and traveling for 12-24 hours before final cleaning and they were okay. Cecil should know about cleaning and eating fish that had previously been frozen. Cecil is currently on a fish delivery trip to BPS Missouri. Back tomorrow.
IMO fish taste should remain good after short term freezing before cleaning. One could do a simple test of cleaning one and freeze one tobe cleaned later. I doubt their would a difference in flavor. I've cleaned dead fish I found in my pond that still had body color, firm flesh, some remaining eye color, and did not detect an off flavor.
Last edited by Bill Cody; 11/05/10 08:29 PM.
