Your guide to buying the right fishing net
A proper fishing net is an essential, yet underrated piece of equipment that many beginner fishermen overlook.
Ask any professional, or simply someone that has plenty of angling experience, and they will surely mention the importance of a sturdy and practical landing net that they use on the regular.
However, even if you choose to get one, deciding on which fishing net to buy may not be as easy as it seems, especially if you don’t know what to look for.
In this article, we will talk about the essentials of choosing the right fishing net and what features make a good product.
Key features of a proper fishing net
While there are many types of fishing nets out there, all made with a specific style of fishing in mind, professionals agree that there are three main things you should focus on.
They are:
- Materials
- Capacity
- Length
Not paying enough attention to this, or simply buying the wrong product can not only hurt the fish you catch, but also increases the risk of you losing your catch.
Now we will dive deeper into each of these factors.
Materials
The main thing to think about here is whether you use single or treble hooks while fishing.
In general the main net materials are:
- Cloth
- Rubber
Rubber is great for those that enjoy angling just for the sport. These nets don’t damage the coat of the fish, which means you can release them safely afterwards. If you are use lures with treble hooks it will be much easer to get them out of net comparing to cloth net.
Cloth net generally are used for coarse fishing anglers feeder fishing or float fishing and then you are using single hooks.
Capacity
Storage capacity is another crucial factor when considering a fishing net. If you do mostly pike fishing, you’ll likely need a lot of space get predator in to net, so a more spacious variant with a lot of storage capacity will work best.
Smaller capacity nets are the better choices where you have limited space available. This might be of interest to those that do plenty of angling from their kayaks, trout fishing etc.
A practical solution can be a folding fishing net, which allows for compact storage without sacrificing capacity.
Length
Finally, there’s the length of your fishing net to consider. Apart from the practical aspects regarding space that we mentioned earlier, length is important because it directly impacts the comfort of your fishing trip.
Longer variants are great because they mean less moving around, especially if you’re fishing from shore.
A short net will work better for those who fishing from boat for pike.
All in all
Today we briefly talked about the key aspects on how to choose a proper fishing net. Length, capacity and materials are all important when considering what’s right for you. So think about these things, the next time you are looking for a fishing net.