Thread: Freezing fish, dumb newbie question.

Well it has been years since I froze any in water with the fins on since my wife prefers the boneless skinless fillets. When I did freeze as you mentioned it was in some sort of container other than plastic zip lock type bags. Country Crock butter tubs and the large Cool Whip bowls were used by my grandmother and of course re-purposed to freeze fish with fins. Not sure of your quantity or size that you are freezing but any plastic container that will fit your catch should work and be sure to leave headspace for the expansion of the water. Any containers you use will hopefully be able to be re-used. There are all kinds of Tupperware type containers out there now, and with Discount stores like Ollies and Big Lots in our area something plastic with a decent lid shouldn't be hard to find and hopefully will even be stackable.

Only leave tails on ,not spines . Scale then fillet is my deal .

When I freeze them in water I use the plastic ziploc storage containers.

I can remember freezing them in milk cartons growing up

Thanks to all. I fillet the crappie, but scale, remove head, gut the bluegill and shell cracker. I had thought about cutting the tops out of 1/2 gallon milk jugs. Stackable tubs sounds good. Thanks.

they must be laid VERY gently in the bags when you bag them with fins on , nestle them carefully and place them in the freezer very gently like you handle a newborn is the word . any slightly rough stuff will result in a penetration in lots of cases .
also use "freezer" bags as they are typically slightly thicker grade bags .
NEVER drop them in tail first in the bag ,super big no no .....just saying

We use gallon milk or water jugs. Cut just enough of the top out to be able to get the fish in without having to force it in. Wash rinse freeze repeat