Squashing Da Bait

Close your eyes and stick your preferred hand into a knee-high slop bucket of worms. Not so easy to collect those slippery squirmers, now is it? Go try grabbing them by the neck – that’s if you can find a neck. This isn’t for breakfast, since you’re taught to never fish on an empty stomach. The fisherman’s hunger becomes a notable impediment to common sense and good fishing. You start by casting your line based on which creature looks the tastiest. Too bad that’s no way to fish.

There are people out there who wish to squash the bait entirely. Believing it’s not necessary to reel in a big catch. They deign to send your worms back to the garden for the easy, botanical, retired life of pampered leisure. A worm hanging onto the tip of your lure lives an exciting existence. These tiny daredevils aren’t around for long, but the thrills they experience in their short time is significantly better than inching around a few geraniums hoping to find a rusted out arrowhead.

It’s crazy that I even have to ask this, but I will anyway. Since it may help. Have you ever attempted to fish without bait? There’s no rhyme, no reason, no time, no season. It can’t be done. Engine sputtering, you floundering, patiently wading for the right time to pounce. But nothing happens. Even Ahab realized that on a certain primal level he was the bait. In the absence of worms, every fisherman must put themselves out there. You won’t do that. You’ll give up after a few soggy sandwiches and return home empty handed. Except for the garbage you brought in. 

These anti-baiters will have you believe that the art of fishing loses nothing of importance when all you have is a thin line and your wits to go on. Firefighters fight fires, at least in theory. But most of us pay little attention to the words carved into countless firehouses. We see “hook and ladder” and don’t give it a second thought. But what would you say if a firefighter showed up to a blaze with some hooks and no ladders. You’d be incensed, and rightfully so. The same goes for fishermen. The ubiquity of Bait & Tackle shops gives us no cause for closer examination. Think about it: without bait, we’re left with only tackle. 

Suddenly you find yourself squatting on the edge of a dock, crouching like an Olympic track star, waiting for a gunshot. You sprint across the wooden planks and dive into the water hoping to bearhug any creatures in the area. But tackling as a fishing technique rarely works. The only circumstances where it might happen, occur after first developing a relationship with said fish. One based on trust, intimacy and yes, some good-natured roughhousing. 

Tackle fish? I don't think so.