live-baiting

[Ben]

oveously you do not move live bait like fish from swim to swim, that is comman sense, but i dont see the difference between using a fish and a worm, apart from the fact that people think fish are nicer than worms so deserve more respect

[Fishin'Widow]

Don't think a worm could spread fishy diseases unless you dunked it in and out of various different water sources, by which time it may have drowned..... I may be wrong. We tend to use dead bait and man made lures for sea fishin. Sweetcorn goes down well too for the old trout.And of course the man made flies that his uncle makes!

[Ben]

but people use things like sand ells for sea fishing and no1 seems to mind, is it 1 of those "out of sight, out of mind" things" where if people dont see it they dont care?

[kiwimarty]

I'm not saying anyone is wrong. I purely wish to expand the debate.

Kiwi.

[Ben]

im not saying any1 is wrong but if i see some1 next to me catching using live baits and i am not then i would use live baits, and i dont see any harm in it, i guess its down to personal preference, abit like fox hunting for example, some people tink its ok and others dont

[Fishin'Widow]

I think it just goes back to the old cruelty thing with us. We don't use live bait with the girls end of story. Myself I don't sea fish in a big way, if I do it's from the shore ( terrible sea sickness and fear of open water)and again it's dead or man made. My hubby on the other hand does boat fish and uses live bait on occasion when doing that but it tends to be provided by the skipper or small stuff that they catch. Where he fishes , off the west coast of Scotland, cut up mackerel goes down a bomb and generally provides a good catch as it honks!

[Old Smoothound]

The debate is still running I see.

The fact that we use worms or Maggots for fishing really does not come into this debate. What I am saying about "live" baiting for Coarse fish such as Pike is this...bring a Roach , Rudd, Perch or Carp or whatever from another water that has been diseased and you stand a very good chance of spreading it to other waters thats how the "Perch" disease spreads and kills off vast quantities of fish.

The only baits I use for sea fishing are worms, Crab , squid, mackerel and Sandeel and perhaps Garfish for Conger. The fact that the worms are alive and perhaps the crab.ie. fresh peeler is not part of the debate.

What we are talking about is... hooking a live fish as bait. Fish not crustaceans and as a recent survey in Norway showed, crustacens such as Lobster, Crab, Prawns etc do not feel pain as we know it...why because their brains do not have the necessary lobes and nerve endings to "feel" pain and are not big enough!

Prawns Crab etc behave the way they do when hooked is an instinctive part of their genetic code...they want to get away from a "Predator" The same goes for worms...in truth it has not been proved beyond doubt that fish feel pain in the same way as we do.

But why as fisherman do we treat Carp, Barbel, Zander and Pike with respect...buy unhooking mats and make sure they go back alive. Its because it is a sport and sporting people do that kind of thing. Could you see Bob Nudd or my old pal the late Ivan Marks killing each fish they had caught and proceeding to gut them on the bank... no..... but I kill my Cod and gut them on the bank because I'm going to take them home and eat them! But I treat Smoothounds with respect and release them as quickly as I can for someone else to try and catch them next time...but my preferred bait is live peeler or Edible Crab!


Different strokes for different folks...me.... I was always taught to respect whatever I shot or caught, and it is part of my country life...long may it continue.
And I have passed it on to my kids and grandchildren, and well done Fishing Widow...keep the girls going along those lines that you have taught them and we might have fishing for all in the future if we all did the same thing.

Oh and by the way I don't use "Live " joey mackerel for Bass fishing.

[team fishing]

i agree the spread of disease from loch to loch is a worry and is an issue for most anglers but i f the live bait is from the loch u r fishing then i think that livebaiting is by far the most effective method of catching pike

[devondave]

ok im with kiwi on this one.

i can see the debate about spreading viruses and such to other waters... but we all livebait in the sea...crabs pout sandeel .. so i am not sure where the difference comes into it other than the spreading of virus part

[kiwimarty]

As I implied before, I am not criticizing but broadening the debate.

On many occasions it has been suggested to me to use a small caught fish, foul hooked or just too small to keep whilst sea angling, for use as a live bait.

Out of personal choice I choose not to but to be honest I can’t really explain why!!

In the same way, I could catch and eat a cod or a bass from the sea and yet would have a problem doing the same to a carp or a pike, again I cannot explain why.

Thanks Shaun for the broadening of the subject.

Kiwi.