Why should everyone try bow fishing? It’s simple and I’d be happy to share with you. Everybody should try it because carp are evil. Seriously. They're not thought of as a ‘sport’ fish around here but every time you toss a line out, you can bet your tackle that there will be massive carp around. Swimming near the surface, teasing us all!
Here in British Columbia, bow fishing falls under spear fishing, if you have the proper license. As such, you would think that there would be some sort of limit on just how many of these carp you can pull out of the water but nope! Since they are an invasive species we can remove as many of them as we want! Good deal!
There are plenty of people here in Canada who don’t think of carp as a great tasting fish, however … I hear from the tourists that those fish are thought of as a delicacy in parts of Europe. To me this says that we Canadians, regardless of how stunning we look in our cold weather gear, have no idea how to properly cook carp. What’s the easiest solution? Go bow fishing! The more of them you pull out, the more practice you’ll have at cooking them.
Getting started in bow fishing doesn't need to be very difficult or overly expensive. Fishing arrows can be made at home easy enough, you can check my ‘Homemade Fishing Arrow’ video for just how simple that can be. Don’t have a bow? Did you know you can make a powerful little bow out of a piece of schedule 40 PVC? It’s true, I've done it. What if you don’t want to make stuff but want to start bow fishing for carp right away anyway? Click on to eBay or Amazon and search ‘Bow Fishing Kits’. It’s amazing just how much is there at an affordable price for most of us. If it’s too expensive then I remind you of the two options listed above.
Sure, there’s a trick to being successful with any bow fishing adventure. Aiming below the target is somewhat different from traditional archery where you aim above it to compensate for arrow drop over distance but one get’s used to it. Sure carp is something of a bone filled nightmare of a fish, so eat it with chopsticks! Problem solved. Even if you just cut it up and toss it to the eagles, who love a free carp meal by the way, you are helping to reduce the carp populations in our lakes. Which is a good thing.
Yes, of course you could just a regular rod & reel to bring in a carp today but would it really be as satisfying? In my humble opinion … not even close. That’s it for this little blog post but remember … get out there and give bow fishing a try!
Happy trails from JT Bear!
