Ohhhh kay kids, I did a bunch of merging and it’s kind of a mess. Like an auto pile-up. :o (Get it? Merging? Yes, affirmative: I am a dork.)
But I kept the original subject lines so if you need to, you can follow those in order to follow each conversation. For most intents and purposes it shouldn’t be necessary - you can pick and choose which information applies to you.
More links for instructions and images of filleting fish (salmon in this case) with an ulu-like knife:
[quote=“heyvictor, post:23, topic:237”]Here’s an ulu I made for my wife out of a piece of an old circular saw blade.
[/quote]That looks awesome, nice job
heyvictor,
thats gorgeous! i’d love to get a gift like that from my partner:)
-nemoralis
Does anyone know how to pick out the swim bladder from the mess of guts you get when cleaning a fish? I keep reading mentions of fish glue made from these swim bladders being used for making composite bows the traditional way, and want to try making some myself. Is there some way to tell it apart from the other organs?
Yeah it’s a transparent bladder with nothing but air in it. You’d either have to get a huge pile of fish or some real big ones to get enough glue to laminate a bow with.
Yea, it takes a lot of the bladders to make a decent amount of glue. Luckily, I eat a lot of fish, and don’t make bows that often.
I’m working at an alternate school. Last week I brought a bunch of deer meat in and a hand crank meat grinder. We ground the deer into hamburger and cooked it with wild rice. Amazing how many of the students there had never really thought about where hamburger comes from.
Next week we’re gonna smoke salmon. I have some whole fish so I’ll show them how to fillet, we’ll collect the alder wood and smoke them. Should be fun if I can keep them from stabbing each other with the fillet knives. (not exactly joking about that one)
I don’t think anyone added this, so I will:
A fishing weir is pretty easy to set up. A weir acts basically as a corral for fish, made by driving wooden stakes into the bottom of the water. The shape and size can vary a lot, but the basic idea is that the opening forms a funnel. The fish will easily find their way in from the wider part of the funnel, but when they get into the weir they have a hard time finding the narrow end of the funneled opening. At this point, spearing them becomes quite a bit easier.
I’m going to try setting one or two of these up at the fishing areas near my house, despite the fact that it’s probably illegal.
Check this out. I love these guys. They noodle for catfish down in Oklahoma. They have regular holes in the river that they visit during the early summer and they stick their hand in there and feel around till a big (30 - 40 lbs.) catfish grabs them then they just grab the catfish by the jaw and haul it out of the water. No rods, no line, no hook, just their bare hands.
Now that is primitive!
Here they’re using stone flakes to skin and fillet with.
Here’s an older thread with lots of pictures of what they caught last year.
I saw a show where someone got pulled under fishing with their hands. Kind of a good thing though…thats a lot of fish! ;D
Probably best to do this in pairs/groups. Shouldn’t be any problem then. The persons friends were able to help him up.
I have some books that talk about “fish tickling”…catching fish by hand (without having them chomp on you). I’ll put some stuff here when I find it. Apparently it works well. One book called it “an old poachers trick”.
My friend told me about an easy way to catch northern pike, but I think this would work on most types of fish. This works best on sunny summer days when the pike is lazy and hangs out in shallow water.
Take some bait, preferably a small fish, and crush it a bit (to make it smell more). Tie it to a pieace of string, then tie the other end to your foot. Grab a large rock, walk into the water and walk around in the weeds to spread the smell of the bait, lift the rock over your head and wait completely still.
When the pike comes after your bait, throw the rock at it(but you don´t have to actually hit it). The shock from the rock will make the fish pass out so you can pick it up.
I haven´t tried this myself though, but its on my list!
noodling is such a cool, but crazy idea. Your using your own body as fish bait, but it works (never tried it though).
I know there’s quite a few heavy metals that can be found in fish (thanks a lot, industrialization!). If you catch some fish in a fresh, running water stream, they should be safe to eat right? Are there any warning signs of metal poisoning, like if the stream runs up alongside an office complex or something?
[quote=“v-rus, post:34, topic:237”]noodling is such a cool, but crazy idea. Your using your own body as fish bait, but it works (never tried it though).
I know there’s quite a few heavy metals that can be found in fish (thanks a lot, industrialization!). If you catch some fish in a fresh, running water stream, they should be safe to eat right? Are there any warning signs of metal poisoning, like if the stream runs up alongside an office complex or something?[/quote]
That’s always gonna depend on the stream. The Duwamish Waterway (damn it it’s a river!) is so polluted that we’re told not to eat anything that lives in the stream. I’ve seen plenty of people pulling salmon out of it, but I would think the further downstream the better.
I know in Washington and Idaho there are warnings for certain waters about not eating more than “X” number of fish meals per month from that water.
Like Lake Roosevelt in Wa. ( which is actually the Columbia River just above Grand Coulee dam). Your not supposed to eat more than a small amount of walleye from there. Because big walleye are predators from higher up the food chain, they have higher concentrations of toxins than say, whitefish. The main sources of the toxins there are a smelter and a pulp mill in BC. Grand Coulee dam creates a humongous settling pond that they call Lake Roosevelt so the bottom of the lake is loaded with heavy metals.
So I would guess if you contact the Dept of Natural Resources in your state they probably could tell you if there are any rivers or lakes with such warnings.
wow, That’s so fucking sad that the water isn’t even safe anymore.
But yeah, good idea. I remember back in Norristown (PA), there’s this river called the skuykill. It was at the bottom of the hill where all the housing developments and neighborhoods are. The river was polluted just from the runoff.
[quote author=clicketyclack link=topic=238.msg11811#msg11811 date=1218671855]
I would think it would be just the opposite. The farther up the stream you go, the less chance of contamination. Especially from industrial runoff.
There’s a stream here that has signs posted, “NO FISHING” but it doesn’t say why. Though a friend of mine told me that as part of his uni study he had to do a water quality test on local rivers and streams. He discovered that most local streams aren’t even safe for boating, let alone swimming, fishing or drinking. Yet I see people swimming in them all the time…
oh, sorry if I was unclear. i was talking specifically about salmon, and pulling them out of the river further downstream, as they’ve been in the river for less time, having just arrived from their adventures at sea, and thus have had less time to absorb the toxins from the river, uh, I mean waterway.
yeah, for drinking, I’d say it’s best upstream. There are very pristine mountain springs that you can just drink as you wish.
And that water test is amazing. Where did he test?
