Quoted message said:
http://www.animalaid.org.uk/h/n/EDUCATION/resources/ALL/1372//
Angling . or fishing . is a sport¯ that involves using a baited hook
on the end of a line to catch fish, who are then reeled in by a rod.
Far from being . as it is made out to be . a gentle pastime that
connects people to nature and encourages conservation of rivers and
lakes, it causes suffering not only to individual fish, but
also to birds and other wildlife.
Coarse angling is the capture of freshwater fish from
rivers and streams, such as pike, bream, rudd and tench.
These fish are inedible, so they are caught just for ¡®fun¡¯
and will often be thrown back into the water. However,
this does not mean that they do not suffer, and a large
number die during or shortly after being caught, from
stress or injury. Coarse anglers have to buy a rod licence,
and, as it is cheaper than game fishing and easier to
hook a fish in a river or lake, it is the most popular form
of the sport.
Game angling involves the capturing and killing of fish
who are considered edible, such as sea trout, salmon
and grayling. Game anglers pay large amounts of money
for a licence to practise their ¡®sport¡¯. This gives them
access to game fisheries, which are rivers or lakes that are
purposely kept stocked with fish. Birds such as cormorants,
herons, owls and kingfishers, and mammals, such as,
otters, who are natural predators of the fish, are ruthlessly
killed in order to preserve the fish for the anglers.
Sea angling requires no licence and takes place on
beaches, rocks, piers and boats. As with game angling,
most fish caught in this way are killed and then eaten.
Examples of sea fish include eel, shark, bass and plaice.
It is a common myth that fish can¡¯t feel pain, but there is
plenty of research proving that they can! The government
advisory body, the Farm Animal Welfare Council (FAWC),
acknowledges that fish experience fear, stress and pain
when removed from water, and that the physiological
mechanisms in fish for experiencing pain are very similar
to those in mammals.
An RSPCA-sponsored report
concluded that all vertebrates . including fish . experience
similar sensations in response to painful stimuli. In pain
sensitivity experiments performed at Edinburgh¡¯s Roslin
Institute, fish had toxin and acid injected into their lips.
They exhibited ¡®rocking¡¯ motion, similar to the way higher
vertebrates . such as people . rock to comfort themselves.
They also rubbed their lips against the tank walls and gravel,
and took three times longer than normal to resume feeding.
¡®Anatomically, physiologically and biologically the
pain system in fish is virtually the same as in birds
and animals.¡¯ Dr Donald Broom, a scientific advisor to
the British government
Nor do fish only have three-second memories! Fish can
perform complex mental tasks, such as mapping out
obstacles in their tanks. And in other tests, spotted
rainbowfish remembered how to escape from a net in
their tank 11 months after initially working it out.
Imagine biting into a delicious apple, and then feeling
your lip being pierced by a hook. The hook pulls on your
lip and all of a sudden you¡¯re yanked violently forward
and dragged along the ground. This is similar to what
happens when anglers catch fish! When hooked fish
are dragged out of the water into the air, they cannot
breathe, and they begin to suffocate . just as you
would if you were dragged underwater and held there.
The hooks are often covered in little spikes called barbs.
Sometimes fish swallow the hook entirely, and the barbs
can cause serious injury to their internal organs, usually
resulting in a painful death.
Fish have a mucous layer over their scales to keep them
waterproof and protect them from infection. When they
are handled, this layer is damaged and they are left
highly susceptible to disease when they are put back
into the water. So they may not die immediately, but
there is a high chance that they will soon afterwards.
Coarse anglers who do not intend to eat the fish that
they have caught will remove the hook from the fish¡¯s
mouth and then put the fish in a keepnet. This net keeps
them captive under the water until the angler has counted
his catch at the end of the fishing session. Keepnets are
often a cause of disease, distress and death because of
overcrowding and lack of oxygen in the water within the
net.
Researchers at the Oklahoma Department of
Wildlife Conservation found that up to 43% of fish
released after being caught died within six days.
Live maggots skewered onto the hook are the
commonest form of bait, athough small fish are
sometimes used to catch larger fish. This is known as
¡®live-baiting¡¯. The small fish are impaled live onto the
hook. They swim around until they are eaten by a
predator (the bigger fish the angler is interested in
catching) or until they die from their injuries.
The nylon line used for angling is non-biodegradable,
which means it does not rot away. Often it becomes
tangled in trees or other vegetation, so it is cut and left
on riverbanks, where it is a great threat to wildlife. Birds
and ducks in particular are at risk and frequently become
fatally trapped in the discarded line. Many swans have
been found with anglers¡¯ hooks embedded in their
throats and stomachs from swallowing discarded lines
with hooks still attached.
A close season (when anglers should not go fishing)
runs from 15 March to 15 June, although regulations
vary in different regions of the country. The close
season is supposed to be a time to allow fish a break
during their spawning season, though it has been
scrapped on all still waters (ponds, lakes and
reservoirs) since 1995.
Killing wildlife
Fish are cold-blooded, salt or freshwater-dwelling
animals. They have a brain, a backbone, a skeleton,
a nervous system and pain receptors all over their
bodies. They breathe oxygen from the water
through their gills. Fish are cold-blooded because,
unlike mammals, their blood temperature fluctuates
with the temperature of the surrounding water.
This allows them to survive as the temperature of
the water changes with the seasons.
FISH FACTS
Things anglers say:
" People who go fishing help to conserve the fish
and their habitats"
It is true that there are some
anglers who monitor the quality of the rivers, and clear
up after themselves. Sadly, however, they are outnumbered
by those who dont bother to get involved in conservation,
and who leave litter around that is hazardous
to wildlife. And how can you argue you are conserving
fish if your hobby involves killing them?
"We should be encouraging young people to take
up fishing as it helps to teach them about nature"
