Is there any truth to the idea that a submerged wire around a fishing boat that has some positive potential relative to the hull of the boat will attract fish?
I see a "black box" advertised for $99 that claims to do the job at :
Is this a ripoff, or is there some benefit to applying a electrical charge to a submerged wire hanging off the boat?
If there is some benefit, why can't you just use a 12 volt battery and resistor to do the same thing and save 100 bucks?
-Bill
I'd recommend starting with a 1.5V cell, maybe an AA or AAA alkaline, and at least a 100K resistor, preferably more.
Take notes as to the results you observe. If you get no results with the one AA cell, try two, then four, then depending on your observations, you might want to try higher voltages, or less resistance; but the fish that have electric sense organs can sense very minute electric fields, like on the order of what's generated by another fish.
See if you can find a platinum or platinum-plated electrode; this will help eliminate electrochemical confounders.
Report back with what you find.
Good Luck! :-) Rich
Kinda. If the wire makes an electric field (practically, this means passing current) the local fish will find it difficult to avoid aligning to the field, which means half of 'em swim straight for the wire, while half swim straight away (and when the field gets small, they randomize their orientation until the field catches 'em again).
I'm not sure of the mechanism (the lateral line is the sense organ for this effect), but it's DEFINITELY against any sensible game laws to fish this way.
Kinda. If the wire makes an electric field (practically, this means passing current) the local fish will find it difficult to avoid aligning to the field, which means half of 'em swim straight for the wire, while half swim straight away (and when the field gets small, they randomize their orientation until the field catches 'em again).
I'm not sure of the mechanism (the lateral line is the sense organ for this effect), but it's DEFINITELY against any sensible game laws to fish this way.
Yup!
My first job was with a small power electronics company that made chopper controllers the DC motors. Specialist stuff back in those days.
One day I was on my own during the lunch break and a van from the East Anglia water board rolled up with a couple of "electronic fishing units" in the back, which he wanted repaired!
I was speechless. But the boxes had the company logo on them and looking inside the big waterproof boxes there was one of our standard chopper control units for printed motor servo motors. They both had simple common faults so I fixed them, and off he went.
Talking to my boss when he came back he explained that they used them for researd, the would connect probes on poles and dip them into the water to stun the fish, which then floated to the surface. They could then easilt pick out a few samples and throw them back after checks (the fish were only stunned) and by taking a photo of the fish that floated to the surface they would later estimate the quantity.
Apparently by varying the frequency, voltage, impulse (a little daughter board made the chopper give intermittent pulses out instead of continuous PWM) they could even be selective about the type and size of the fish they stunned.
Those choppers, IIRC, were 2KW and worked at 3KHz with a nominal output voltage of 160V, just to give you some idea of what you are looking at.
But he said, "attract", not "stun".
Hell, if you just want to get fish on the cheap, use dynamite. Not too much, though, because you don't want to rupture their air bladder - that sinks them. ;-)
Good Luck! Rich
Indonesian fisherman use bombs. What they dont realise is that they are destroying the reef in the process, hence destroying there traditional fishing grounds. IT is now illegal and I beleive Indonesian authorities are now policing it. It is interesting to watch them light those things and chuck them in. THe bomb itself looks like a little red oil can with out the handle.
I have also seen the electrical/electronic method of stunning fish, but as mentioned alsewhere here, the fish have to be there first. It does not attract them...
Light at night on the other hand.. I use ot for sea mullet and prawns..
put anough charge on it and it'll stun them and you'll just be able to grab them off the surface. (prolly illegal and all that)
Bye. Jasen
True. Northwest salmon trollers have been using them for years. A lot of the early study was done by Bill Russel of Russels Electronics in Victoria. His subsequent "black box" was called the V.I.P. for Variable Impressed Potential. Google some of these terms maybe you'll be lucky!
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