ACA Mag. Bailey's piece???

[Newt]

Keepnets - does anyone have real data as opposed to opinions and some anecdotal material?

 

Pottinger, T.G. (1997). Effects of retention of fish in keepnets. Ambleside: Institute of Freshwater Ecology, Environment Agency, 36p.

might shed some light on the topic but I can't locate an online version so don't know what it might say.

 

http://www.fao.org/docrep/meeting/004/y6849E.htm and the section on fish handling lists that reference but otherwise doesn't have much to say that I can find.

 

As to angler's live baiting giving the anti crowd ammunition - I have never noticed them needing any other than what they can manufacture. Has anyone ever been in a discussion with a serious Anti-angler and after telling them you did not use live bait, being told, "Well that's OK then. I'm no longer against your hobby."

[slodger]

I find it SO frustrating to hear time and time again these pious comments championing fish 'welfare'.

 

One day the misguided fraternity of anglers that relentlessly harp on and on about the importance of caring for fish, are going to talk us all out of a legitimate passtime. We all know that to preserve our sport we have to subscribe to a sensible level of resposibility and care. However to keep bringing it to the forefront of peoples minds, to keep trumpeting it at every given opportunity is a dire folly. Make no mistake about it!

 

Idiots like Bailey who spend countless words, in high profile written outlets, hellbent on 'out conserving' the next angler, are like a malignant canker to our sport. How much of a fool do you have to be to not see the hypocrisy of this man's ethos?

 

It's plain and it's simple. The very best way of ensuring we cause no harm to fish, of tending to 'fish welfare', is to stop fishing for them all together! How many of us want that?

[Steve Walker]

Newt:

Keepnets - does anyone have real data as opposed to opinions and some anecdotal material?

 

Pottinger, T.G. (1997). Effects of retention of fish in keepnets. Ambleside: Institute of Freshwater Ecology, Environment Agency, 36p.

might shed some light on the topic but I can't locate an online version so don't know what it might say.

Tom Pottinger was one of my PhD supervisors (my work was on the use of marks left in fish otoliths as a permanent indicator of periods of physiological stress). I haven't read the paper, but as I recall his comment to me was that retaining fish in a keepnet had no effect on the plasma cortisol levels of the fish. This is entirely to be expected, in that merely handling fish is enough to send their cortisol levels through the ceiling. If you want to measure their baseline cortisol levels you have to net them quickly and get them immediately into a bucket of anaesthetic. Certainly by the time you have played a fish to the landing net and put it into the keepnet, it will be showing a strong stress response. You should bear in mind when thinking about this that the stress response is a normal and natural phenomenon which functions to enhance the fish's chance of surviving in the short term the episode which induces it; being chased by a predator or stranded in a pool, for example.

 

What you read into this depends on what question you are trying to answer. If the question is whether catching and retaining fish in a keepnet increases the level of physiological stress as measured by plasma cortisol levels over just catching it, then no, it doesn't. That's a useful thing to know in that chronic elevation of cortisol levels suppresses the immune system of the fish and makes it more susceptible to disease.

 

I suppose that if you keep a fish in a net long enough for the levels to start to return to normal (which takes some time) you will raise them again when you remove them from the net, but I really can't see any way of saying catching a fish on rod and line is acceptable but keeping them in a net for a while unacceptably compromises their welfare.

 

If the question is whether keeping a fish in a keepnet imposes some kind of cruelty, well, that's a difficult thing to quantify. I do remember Tom talking about his work in the context of "pain" and saying that it was simply a question which could not be answered scientifically because "pain" is a word we use to describe our own psychological response to certain stimuli, and it's not possible directly to translate that to the experience of a fish. Likewise, how would we imagine confining a fish would be cruel? Fear? Claustrophobia? Frustration? What do those essentially human constructs mean to a roach?

 

Personally, I think I can identify experiences analogous to those we feel in a dog, a cat, a pig, but in an eel? What about a lamprey? A slug? A sea cucumber? To what extent is our empathy with other mammals simply a matter of the underlying mechanics of their behaviour being similar enough to our own for their reactions to be familiar? Does my cat "think" in a way I would recognise as thinking, or is what I perceive as consciousness an overlay on top of a set of unconscious behaviours and reactions I share with the cat?

 

You can't answer the question, it's not science, more a mixture of philosophy and wild speculation.

 

The real objection to keepnets, I think, is the possibility of physical damage to the fish caused by abrasion to the skin, barbed fin rays catching in the mesh, unsuitable positioning of the net leading to oxygen deprivation, crush injuries from the weight of other fish, etc. These, I think, are all problems which can be avoided if care is taken and an appropriate net used for the species in question.

 

In my opinion, used correctly, a keepnet does not pose a welfare problem for fish, and had the f***ing mice not eaten the expensive 6 month old one I had in the shed, I'd have no qualms about using it. The crux of the matter is "used correctly". They often are not. I think that if you can return a fish physically none the worse from being in a net, you have done it no more harm than you did in catching it in the first place. If your net is full of scales and the fish you return are half-dead, you're doing something wrong.

[Isaac]

I've not read John Bailey's article as I don't think he is a vey good writer, my opinion. His content maybe good but it doesn't strike me as being well presented. I've tried reading his books and give up. Yes, I have progressd beyond "Janet and John go Piking".

I could not do any better I know but sometimes life is too short.

[Bob Bradford]

Divisive drivel coming from high profile writers,pike anglers,match anglers ,fly fishermen ;ad nausea,

 

We must not undermine ourselves, that much is clear, I may or may not agree with live-baiting, but why should I agree to banning it?

 

Angling is a crude,old as the hills pastime, people of all ages,creeds and gender participate in for personal pleasure, HOW DARE A FELLOW ANGLER TRY TO STOP A SINGLE ASPECT OF IT,simply because they feel it is morally wrong, if you do not agree with keep-nets,simple,don't use one! but do not preach to others whilst impaling a treble into a live fish, the Hypocrisy stinks!

 

Anglers must stand united on every aspect of our sport/pastime, and stop defending it by conceding this or that,it will be the end of angling otherwise.

[Vagabond]

As someone who usually gives John Bailey's articles a miss, I didn't comment on this thread.

 

However, I happened to be fishing with an editor of a provincial angling newspaper yesterday, and he had read the ACA article and was not at all happy about the tone.

 

So, came home and read it - and must agree with Slodger (except for the point about a "great" writer - the first thing that caught the "eye" - pun intended - was fourteen personal pronouns in the first paragraph). Also read (until nausea cut the reading short) a similar article by the same author in Classic Angling - which had a large area of overlap with the ACA piece.

 

Most experienced anglers show a proper respect for their quarry, whether they catch and release their quarry, or kill it and cook it. For beginners, there is plenty of guidance as to how best handle individual species (eg on this forum you can readily find gen on handling pike, carp, barbel, tope, skate etc)

 

For the most part, this is done quietly and efficiently, without the need for self-righteous screeching. As an example, one of my clubs forbids pike fishing until the member concerned has attended an instruction session and handled pike under supervision - and had his club card stamped accordingly.

 

Steve Walker's comments on the LACK of stress upon fish temporarily confined in keep nets is interesting reading.

 

Of course, keep nets can be misused - I am old enough to remember a roach fisherman that caught roach steadily for a week, keeping them in a number of nets until there were sufficient for a "big bag" shot that made him "famous" (at least in his own eyes)

[Paul Boote]

Vagabond:

 

 

 

For the most part, this is done quietly and efficiently, without the need for self-righteous screeching.

Just as it should be.

 

Good posting, Vagabond.

[Peter Waller]

Just for the record, my objection to keepnets is not based on supposed cruelty, nor morality, but more that their use damages our own sport.

 

The question of keepnets has been well discussed on AN over the years and there does appear to be a fairly general acceptance that fish are physically damaged by their use.

 

Fish welfare, conservation, is important. Without it we have no sport. Just a case of finding a happy medium. However I firmly believe that J.B. goes beyond that point.

 

As Vagabond suggests, there should be no need for self righteous screeching. To that I would add 'high level'just before 'self'.

 

And, by the way Bob, I gave up livebaiting a good while back. Not because I see it as cruel, but because of that conservation factor. My choice, but I fail to see why I should damage your sport in the furtherence of my own. Like you I stand by the right of others to practice it. And if that is self righteous screeching then I am a hypocrit!

 

[ 06. October 2005, 08:21 AM: Message edited by: Peter Waller ]

[Jim Gibbinson]

To whom it may concern,,

 

Opinions are not given weight by being discourteous, insulting or abusive. Quite the contrary, in fact.

[Bob Bradford]

We all have our own code Peter, whether an angler is a match/specimen/predator/game or sea exponent, it matters not, we all have a common bond and should respect the choices others make in our sport/pastime, I will stand shoulder to shoulder with ANY of the above and fight anglings corner, but I will not concede one solitary, legal angling activity to the anti's or a fellow angler, that is nothing more than pious claptrap, the question is simple enough for all to understand;

Am I for angling or against it? there are no grey areas, for once we allow grey areas to play a part, that is the beginning of the end, give one solitary inch, and the anti's will take the proverbial mile, we MUST stand as one.