To Catch A Fish...

If you are around a clean body of water, the easiest way by far to obtain necessary calories and especially protein is fish.  Eating plants and foraging has it’s place but it’s really hard to get enough to eat and survive for a long period of time on greens.  The reasons are many, but generally speaking you aren’t going to find vegetables and crops like corn, beans and rice in abundance when foraging!  Plants that grow wild have some calories and vitamins, especially berries and such, but not anywhere near what you would get from cultivated plants like you would find in a garden.  What you need to survive and do hard labor like getting firewood, building shelter etc. is fats and protein and that means meat.

Therefore, seeing as how fish hooks and fishing line are probably the lightest and easiest way of carrying meat getting gear, the wise and prepared person will try to have with them a dozen or so small hooks and a few yards of fishing line, minimum 20 lb. test for maximizing catching fish without breaking a line.  I can think of no other more effective way of getting calories and protein in the wilderness or seaside than this.  You can make a bobber or float out of a light piece of wood and a stick for a pole, so all you really need to carry is the hooks and line.  Remember, you can catch a large fish on a small hook but you can’t catch a small fish on a big hook, so you should probably carry only small hooks, number 6 or smaller.

You wouldn’t have the luxury of a fishing pole in a survival situation, so you would be reduced to cane pole like fishing, using a stick etc. or hand jigging or limb line fishing, or putting out a trot line.  These are some of the methods that every preparedness minded person should know.  Also, you need to know how to build weirs and primitive fish traps as well as a basic understanding of what bait to use, if any, to catch the type of fish that may be in the local body of water that you’re fishing.

Jesus told four of his disciples, Peter and Andrew, James and John, to come follow Him and He would make them fishers of men.  They were experienced fishermen who fished with nets on the Sea of Galilee.  What Jesus was referring to was the fact that in order to reach people with the message of the Gospel, a person needs to understand the type of person (fish) you are trying to reach/catch, what they are interested in (Bait), how deep to go to find them (the depths of sin),  where to find them (where they school), and what to do after you reach/catch them ie. the cleaning process (discipleship).  Are you a fisher of men?  Or maybe you haven’t been reached yet with the message of the Good News, the Gospel of God’s Love for you!  Either way, whether you have already been caught and cleaned by the Gospel or are going to be, the idea of fishing for men is an intriguing one and deserves attention.  I’m glad, on a personal level, that someone was fishing for me.  Many years ago I was caught by the message of the Gospel and gave my heart and life to God.  How about you?

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PS. We have just added a Facebook Page, it’s WayPoint Survival.  Look us up and send us a friend request!  You can also check out my other websites where you can set up training for many of these skills at www.waypointsurvival.com and look at and order my custom knives at www.benderknifeworks.com.

James B.