Should I be using a landing net if I’m fishing from the bank?

If you are fishing from the bank, you are most likely fishing shallows either in the early morning or late evening, when it’s cooler and the fish will be feeding in those shoreline shallows.  If you use a landing net, you run the risk of stressing the fish and scaring them away early, sending them back out to the depths of the waters away from your nice spot on the bank.

While it’s okay to use one if you insist, most people will not.  It runs too great a risk of losing your catch and forcing you to take a boat out in the heat of the day.  It’s a better idea to use landing nets out in the lake or river, or when the temperatures during the middle of the day don’t get above 65 or 70, since you are less likely to scare the fish back to the “cold” waters – they’ll find the warmth of the sun in the shallows too comfortable in most cases during the early spring or late fall, just before and after the really cold season, to be chased out of their warm feed holes.

Of course, it’s different for every angler, and it also depends on the type of fish you are targeting.  Some sunfish are easy to catch from the bank with a landing net any time, since they rarely leave shallow areas.  You might also find this with some bass because they sometimes rest in such shallow water that they are practically dry and may be too lazy to be spooked.

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