I chomped on a passive integrated transponder (PIT) in a lake trout

I was eating some left-over lake trout which I had caught in Lindbergh Lake, and I bit on something which crunched.  I spit it out, and it was the tiny electronic device shown below.  Which is apparently a passive integrated transponder (PIT), which is a kind of electronic fish tag.  I sent it to a fisheries biologist with the Montana Department of Fish, Wildlife, and Parks, but he said it had been damaged and he couldn't read it.  I don't know if he couldn't read it because I chomped it, or he couldn't read it because I microwaved it.  He said the only lake trout which had been tagged in that drainage had been tagged in Swan Lake in 2007 by a graduate student who was pursuing some project.  I have read that PITs aren't supposed to be placed in edible portions of edible fish, but this PIT had been.  Apparently they clipped the adipose fin of the fish which were tagged, but I didn't notice that.  Clipped adipose fins normally aren't something you have to watch for on lake trout.



Here's the recipe, which is excellent both with lake trout and with salmon:  Put the fish in a baking pan.  Sprinkle it with black pepper and slather it with peach mango salsa.  Garnish with a passive integrated transponder.  Cook at 425 until it's done.

I hope you didn't eat any glass or hurt your teeth.

Like you read, the PIT tag should have been in the abdominal cavity of the fish.  If you are off on your tagging it is possible to put one into muscle tissue but it would be a very rare event.. 

It's too bad the tag was damaged that would have been interesting information.  Do you know anything about the 2007 study and the size of fish they were tagging?

Owie. That could have been bad. Hope all is ok!  Interesting story!!!

Be careful Pete could be a government conspiracy trying to get a tag in the wild and elusive Pmmpete via his favored meal, check your elk real careful before eating it too!

I was thinking more about this and remember talk of people tagging dorsal once the fish reached a specific suze.  I only tagged small fish (sub 200mm) so never did a dorsal PIT tag.

If the study was on larger Lakers it would explain how the tag was in the flesh.

I hope you didn't eat any glass or hurt your teeth.

Owie. That could have been bad. Hope all is ok!  Interesting story!!!

Nope, the only thing which got busted was the tag.

Be careful Pete could be a government conspiracy trying to get a tag in the wild and elusive Pmmpete via his favored meal, check your elk real careful before eating it too!

Once the government gets us all tagged, it'll be easier for United Nations troops to imprison us in tunnels underneath closed Walmart stores in Texas.

Be careful Pete could be a government conspiracy trying to get a tag in the wild and elusive Pmmpete via his favored meal, check your elk real careful before eating it too!

Once the government gets us all tagged, it'll be easier for United Nations troops to imprison us in tunnels underneath closed Walmart stores in Texas.
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Damn, here I was, thinking NWKA was safe from Jade Helm tin hats...