Netting good fishing tales

By MICHAEL FOREMAN

Anglers are renowned for telling stories, but the internet has given full reign to their creativity.

Fishing tales abound on the message boards of general fishing portals, specialised fishing story websites, and the several fishing-related newsgroups on the Usenet network.

The alt.fishing newsgroup is used mainly for exchanging tips and asking for information, such as: "What is the ideal rod length for pier saltwater fishing in the Gulf of Mexico?"

But we did see some stories posted here, including one titled: "Friday the 13th - a true fishing story," which turned out to be a scary tale of catastrophic tackle loss.

On the alt.flyfishing newsgroup, the topic "fish fake orgasms" caught our attention. According to this post, Swedish researchers observed that in 69 out of 117 couplings, female trout "faked" the quivering movements that stimulate the male to release sperm.

Several web-based message boards include sections devoted to angling tales and some, such as www.smartgroups.com, also allow you to post photos of your memorable catches.

One of the strangest angling story websites is Alternative Great Fishing Stories: Tales of Fishing Trips Where No Fish [Were] Caught.

"Aren't you tired of reading about all those ever-so-perfect fishing tales where a 1000kg blue marlin is landed with 8lb line," asks the blurb.

"Here, we are dedicated to bringing you the cold reality of fishing trips where everything that could go wrong went wrong, where the only action of the day was the entanglement of each other's lines and where hopes die and enthusiasm is extinguished."

The joke obviously wore thin on the site's author as its (predictably boring) content may now only be viewed with the help of google.com's cache function, which saves copies of defunct web pages.

Strangely, we could find little evidence of "the one that got away" stories - unless you count pleas from anglers who have left expensive items of clothing or tackle at fishing spots and are hoping to contact the finders over the net.

But plenty of stories convey something of the magic of a fishing expedition, and local site www.fishing.net.nz stands out in this department.

For example, one of our favourites was Peter Francis' story "Alaskan Combat Fishing" which chronicles the perils of hunting king salmon.

Anyone fishing in this state must be wary of moose - "they can make a hell of a mess of a car" - and bears. Most anglers carry shotguns.

Links

Fish Fake Orgasms

Smart Groups

Post photos of memorable catches

Alternative Great Fishing Stories

Alaskan Combat Fishing