The other night we ended up shooting 10 bowfin.  My personal best, a 10-2, was the largest at 30 1/4″ Length and 16″ Girth.  What do you do if you don’t have scales on the boat, but are really curious to know how much a big bruiser bowfin weighs?  Better yet, how can you selectively shoot bowfin that are only in citation size classes and up?  Sure you can guess how big they are under water, but what if somebody took a lot of the guess work out of it for you.  Here is a weight table based on lots and lots of known-sized fish.  If you know the fish’s length and girth, you can get very close to the real weight by referencing this chart.

I tested the chart on our 6 biggest bowfin from the other night.

Actual weight = 10-2, 30 1/4 length, 16 girth = 10.6 lbs projected weight

Actual weight = 9-5, 29 3/4 length, 15 1/8 girth = 9.2 lbs projected weight

Actual weight = 9-1, 29 1/8 length, 15 1/2 girth = 9.1 lbs projected weight

Actual weight = 7-6, 26 3/4 length, 13 3/4 girth = 7.4 lbs projected weight

Actual weight = 9-10, 30 1/4 length, 15 3/8 girth = 9.5 lbs projected weight

Actual weight = 8-2, 29 3/8 length, 13 3/4 girth = 8.2 lbs projected weight

Basically, that chart looks pretty accurate to me.  If you are aiming for a certain weight class bowfin, it gives you a good reference length to shoot for.  Personally, if I want to beat my personal best bowfin, I need to find a bowfin that measures at least 32-33″.  So basically, next weekend I might be selectively picking on bowfin that stretch the tape past 30″ if we can find some.  Hope the bowfishermen out there enjoyed this post!