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This is a dedicated thread for discussing article: Loving the Fish we Catch
Loving the Fish we Catch
- Thread starter FishingMagic
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Fine sentiments, but do be aware of the irony in wealthy, Western, doing quite nicely thank you, Destination Fisher types tutting and finger-wagging in admonition about how foreigners treat THEIR fish (not our fish, we're just "This is how you should do it", "We know best", busy-body visitors). We - Anglers in the "developed" world - live in a very pretty, self-made, often self-deluding, bubble and increasingly cannot see beyond its glittering custom-color confines these days.
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Being brought up fishing the little mountain streams and rushing rivers of mid Wales I never returned a fish over about 5 inches. That was until I tried eating my first chub. After that experience if it didn't have an adipose fin it went back, regardless of the size.
MarkTheSpark
Senior Member
I'm not sure UK angling can make great claims for fish welfare when its favourite 'sport' currently is catching carp from overstocked puddles; surely no better (or worse) than driven pheasant shooting, in which semi-tame birds just a few months old get their first and last taste of sustained flight over a WWI-like barrage of artillery.
I don't think the non angling public regard fish in general much above the status of snails and insects.
This to us anglers is a double edged sword. On one hand it means that the antis never make much of an impression on Joe public who likes his fish on a slab or in batter. Carp-chub-cod? All the same to him." They are just fish Aint they?"
On the other hand there is not much outrage at pollution causing fish deaths. Not like there is when sea birds get covered in oil slick or a lovely cuddly otter gets caught in eel traps.
I don't think we can have it both ways. If the public thought that fish could feel pain like for instance foxes there would be marches and MPs being lobbied to make angling illegal.
When anyone does say to me" angling is cruel sticking hooks in fish" I reply with"Do you eat fish? Have you seen those film clips where large mounds of fish are dumped on trawlers decks and walked over by the trawler men before being gutted alive? Will you now continue to eat fish?"
If ever an impossible law is passed that every fish caught is humanely dispatched by commercial fisherman, then I think we could really be in trouble.
This to us anglers is a double edged sword. On one hand it means that the antis never make much of an impression on Joe public who likes his fish on a slab or in batter. Carp-chub-cod? All the same to him." They are just fish Aint they?"
On the other hand there is not much outrage at pollution causing fish deaths. Not like there is when sea birds get covered in oil slick or a lovely cuddly otter gets caught in eel traps.
I don't think we can have it both ways. If the public thought that fish could feel pain like for instance foxes there would be marches and MPs being lobbied to make angling illegal.
When anyone does say to me" angling is cruel sticking hooks in fish" I reply with"Do you eat fish? Have you seen those film clips where large mounds of fish are dumped on trawlers decks and walked over by the trawler men before being gutted alive? Will you now continue to eat fish?"
If ever an impossible law is passed that every fish caught is humanely dispatched by commercial fisherman, then I think we could really be in trouble.