Best way to keep trout until you can clean them....

[jopes]

cut a gill plate or cut the throat. it will not take them long to die but they will be a lot less bloody.

[fishboat]

Not sure where your fishing, but visit any great lakes salmon/trout port (not erie) and take a look how the guys store fish as they come in...they all have a cooler with a couple bags of ice in it. Net the fish, whack it in the head with a small bat, toss it in the cooler.

I've never seen them lose color on the outside. Laker flesh is golden-yellow-ish. Smaller ones (less than 10 lbs) are good. If you're fishing great lakes, I'd avoid the big ones. When you clean them skip the belly meat (half fat).

[capt. spanky]

snip the connecting tissue that the gills attach to at the mouth end of the fish.If you spread the gill plates open it is quite evident what they attach to. If you cut through it cleanly the blood flow will be obvious.After a couple minutes in live well put on ice. Done deal!

[jaslaf]

I knock them on the head cut their gills and let them bleed out in a 5 gallon bucket half filled with water and after about 10 minutes put them on ice in a cooler and dump the water over the side.

[rabbit]

newspaper on crushed ice

[rabbit]

crushed ice and newspaper in a good cooler