Fish poisoning
- Thread starter fishy1
- Start date
Horse Chestnut conkers contain saponins which are a common fish poison. Wikipedia says 20 conkers in 6L of water are enough to wash various cloth types, so I'd imagine this would be your baseline for a hypothetical dosing scenario. I'm pretty sure it's illegal to practice this in the UK, unless of course you are planning to dispatch your Goldfish.
Don't know how you'd make or store lime chloride (I assume you mean Calcium Chloride here), I guess you'd start by making quicklime, Calcium Oxide, but you can find it in dehumidifiers.
Don't know how you'd make or store lime chloride (I assume you mean Calcium Chloride here), I guess you'd start by making quicklime, Calcium Oxide, but you can find it in dehumidifiers.
Mod hat on here.
It's illegal in the UK, and BcUK does not advocate or encourage it's use.
It's not really poisoning, it de-oxygenating....sort of. It leaves the fish unconcious but as they float downstream, and if they avoid other predators, they will, usually, recover, if a bit hangovered.
The major problem is that it toxifies a big area of water and will affect not only your target species, and they don't all recover.
Might be best to get yourself on one of the courses that discuss trapping and fishing methods if you're really interested in the topic.
cheers,
Toddy
It's illegal in the UK, and BcUK does not advocate or encourage it's use.
It's not really poisoning, it de-oxygenating....sort of. It leaves the fish unconcious but as they float downstream, and if they avoid other predators, they will, usually, recover, if a bit hangovered.
The major problem is that it toxifies a big area of water and will affect not only your target species, and they don't all recover.
Might be best to get yourself on one of the courses that discuss trapping and fishing methods if you're really interested in the topic.
cheers,
Toddy
Mullein (Verbascum sp.) is another plant that is supposed to work, but, as has been stated before, it is illegal.
Cheers,
Tom
Cheers,
Tom
still not a good idea to make mini-ecological disasters. At the risk of sounding like a tree hugger.
As a foraging skill I have only seen it being used on small streams where the fish are pretty tiny and the flow isn't all that great, or on reefs where divers use little squeezy bottles of cyanide.
In large still bodies of water, or larger, faster rivers, I can see it being a highly inefficient and unsustainable method of fishing. If you use enough of whatever it is to stun large fish in a lake, chances are that you will kill off all the small fry and possibly a lot of other life as well.
In Britain you are never so far from rescue that you would have call to use the technique and elsewhere in the world the plants are likely to be different, so it may be difficult to apply.
Even if it were legal, I can't see that there would be much point in "practicing" it as a skill on these little islands, not when you could be practicing more productive illegal methods, like gill nets and spring snares :BlueTeamE
In large still bodies of water, or larger, faster rivers, I can see it being a highly inefficient and unsustainable method of fishing. If you use enough of whatever it is to stun large fish in a lake, chances are that you will kill off all the small fry and possibly a lot of other life as well.
In Britain you are never so far from rescue that you would have call to use the technique and elsewhere in the world the plants are likely to be different, so it may be difficult to apply.
Even if it were legal, I can't see that there would be much point in "practicing" it as a skill on these little islands, not when you could be practicing more productive illegal methods, like gill nets and spring snares :BlueTeamE
My understanding of this is that all netters must be registered, for example, you need the permission of the person who has the rites to salmon net on that shore (most are bought up I believe), in order to use a gill net from shore if you are after salmon or sea trout. From boat or other species you need to be registered.
Woodsmoke, I have heard to the contrary and I looked heavily into this. Stationary gill nets can't be put in a place where they can take migratory fish unless you have permision. This basically means you have to set it so the surface of the net is 2m from the water surface, as salmon swim in the top of the water level. I think you can set them in water where they won't catch migratory spieces without a license, also you can't do it in bass nursery areas. You don't need any kind of license to keep your catch, and if you use a non motorised vessel less than 10m long or do it from the shore, you can sell your catch without a license.
Hi mate its a pity this site is becoming so politically correct and an answer cant be given to a question without the usual reminders of BCUK dosent advocate this or BCUK dosent advocate that, after all you did put the question in a survival situation. Sorry i dont have an answer to your question i am just fed up with usual site police scrutinising questions and treating people like children!
Understand what you mean Combatblade, the unfortunate thing is we live in a society where thought-crime is becoming a reality - when you can go to jail for just possessing reading material LIKELY to be useful to a "terrorist". So it's prudent to make sure thngs are in context, and to make sure the community is not SEEN to condone any illegal activitty.
You are out of order Combatblade1.
The protocols of this site are clearly stated and BcUK has always endeavoured to be legally correct.
I do not appreciate being called the site police for simply stating that an action is illegal; it's known as a pre-emptive strike, and was done quite deliberately.
If you had been on the site longer, or read some of the past threads more clearly, you would have seen the furore that discussions of illegal fishing methods have caused.
I'm a Mod, I'm supposed to diffuse a flash point. I did so.
This topic has already been well covered. I know, I contributed information to the previous thread; but it's still illegal.
Toddy
The protocols of this site are clearly stated and BcUK has always endeavoured to be legally correct.
I do not appreciate being called the site police for simply stating that an action is illegal; it's known as a pre-emptive strike, and was done quite deliberately.
If you had been on the site longer, or read some of the past threads more clearly, you would have seen the furore that discussions of illegal fishing methods have caused.
I'm a Mod, I'm supposed to diffuse a flash point. I did so.
This topic has already been well covered. I know, I contributed information to the previous thread; but it's still illegal.
Toddy
Since you admit you didn't have anything useful to add, it might have been better for you to have kept quiet.
Keep on in this vein and see where it gets you.
Comments such as Toddy's regarding the legality of a subject under discussion are not aimed only at the members taking part in that discussion. Perhaps you are forgeting the number of guests and non-posting members that read this site. Given the number of juvenile idiots in the community at large one cannot assume that everyone reading this will have such a mature grasp of the legalities already.
If you find the few rules of the site too much to come to terms with, there are other forums that I am sure would be glad to have you as a more frequent visitor.
Back on subject:
As best as I can tell, Lime Chloride is another name for Calcium Hypochlorite, which is used as a solid form of chlorine for adding to swimming pools and the like. I can't see how, in a survival situation, you could stop worrying about fire, shelter, drinking water and rescue long enough to start making either Calcium Hypochlorite or Calcium Chloride (for which I think you need strong acids or amoinia and quite a few reactions). Even if it were possible, it seems like it would be more trouble than it would be worth.
Interesting info about the depth at which salmon swim. I know they can lie right on the bottom in quite deep water once they have entered the river, it never occured to me that they wouldn't hug the bottom in the tidal areas.
Someone I know from a different forum extracted saponins from horse chestnuts to make
bubbles for a physics experiment (nothing to do with bushcraft) and apparently they have
some very interesting properties (the bubbles), and the smell of the stewing chestnuts
could take your nose off
I think if saponins get into the bloodstream they can cause the membrane covering red
blood cells to break down (not good) but that this isn't the way that they have their
effect on the fish as far as I know.
bubbles for a physics experiment (nothing to do with bushcraft) and apparently they have
some very interesting properties (the bubbles), and the smell of the stewing chestnuts
could take your nose off
I think if saponins get into the bloodstream they can cause the membrane covering red
blood cells to break down (not good) but that this isn't the way that they have their
effect on the fish as far as I know.
It can be nasty stuff. It does make an excellent soap for linen though, I tried it after the last thread, stinks though.
With fish it gets pretty much straight to the blood stream since it's taken in through the gills. The only reason some survive is that if they drift into clean water quickly enough the stuff seems to get flushed out. The aesculine in the nuts, and the bark, gives a translucent blue to the water.
It's also very good for varicose veins and haemorrhoids so I'm told
cheers,
Toddy
With fish it gets pretty much straight to the blood stream since it's taken in through the gills. The only reason some survive is that if they drift into clean water quickly enough the stuff seems to get flushed out. The aesculine in the nuts, and the bark, gives a translucent blue to the water.
It's also very good for varicose veins and haemorrhoids so I'm told
cheers,
Toddy
Aha, I see
I suppose they can be absorbed across the gills then. Nasty stuff! I wonder if the
concentration is enough to start wrecking blood cells, or just interfere with oxygen
metagolism... http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Saponin
I'd never heard of aesculine (pretty word) but I can see where it comes from with a name
like that - I looked it up on the 'pedia and found that it's also used in lab tests to identify
bacteria - http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Aesculin
Gosh
Anyway you will all be delighted to learn that I can now identify horse chestnuts by
twig alone thanks to the Hainault Forest website - but I've no plans to extract things
from them, honest.
http://www.hainaultforest.co.uk/3Winter twigs.htm
I suppose they can be absorbed across the gills then. Nasty stuff! I wonder if the
concentration is enough to start wrecking blood cells, or just interfere with oxygen
metagolism... http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Saponin
I'd never heard of aesculine (pretty word) but I can see where it comes from with a name
like that - I looked it up on the 'pedia and found that it's also used in lab tests to identify
bacteria - http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Aesculin
Gosh
Anyway you will all be delighted to learn that I can now identify horse chestnuts by
twig alone thanks to the Hainault Forest website - but I've no plans to extract things
from them, honest.
http://www.hainaultforest.co.uk/3Winter twigs.htm
One interesting aspect that could arise from this discussion is the morality of fish poisoning and whether or not (not being patronising here, but I can't think of a better term) 'native peoples' would consider fish poisoning immoral.
In our times, many people object to factory farming, GM crops, overfishing, etc. Fish poisoning might be seen to be an 'olden times' equivalent to some of these practices and I wonder whether some peoples might have consciously chosen not to do this for ethical reasons (or perhaps practical ones, if it caused the entire fish stock of a water to be eliminated).
Any thoughts on this?
Geoff
In our times, many people object to factory farming, GM crops, overfishing, etc. Fish poisoning might be seen to be an 'olden times' equivalent to some of these practices and I wonder whether some peoples might have consciously chosen not to do this for ethical reasons (or perhaps practical ones, if it caused the entire fish stock of a water to be eliminated).
Any thoughts on this?
Geoff
I'm really interested in this as when I worked as a warden on a coastal reserve, this is what I was told from my glorious leader
, the advice I was given in Scotland was that it was illegal unless you were registered...hence the hoohah about unregulated netting/illegal fishing.
