Traditional net fishing
Discipline · Last reviewed 2026-08-10
Small-scale netting methods with long regional histories — cast nets, hand-hauled seines, dip nets and river netting — described here for what they are, not as instruction.
Netting is older than hooks and, worldwide, still catches more fish than every recreational method combined. The traditional forms — a cast net thrown over shoaling fish, a seine hauled between two people along a shore, a dip net worked in a river channel — are among the most culturally embedded fishing practices there are, and several of them are protected or restricted precisely because of that.
This record describes what those methods are, how they work mechanically, where they come from, and what they mean environmentally. It does not teach them, for a specific and practical reason: netting by an individual is restricted or prohibited across most of Europe, is subject to licensing and heritage protections where it survives, and publishing technique would be publishing instructions for something most readers cannot lawfully do.
Where traditional netting does survive under licence — Solway haaf netting is a well-documented example — it exists as a heritage practice under close regulatory control rather than as a general fishing method.
- Section
- Other fishing
- Coverage
- Explained for context and understanding, not taught
FishingHQ covers this method for what it is, how it works, where it came from and what it costs the environment. It does not teach it. Some of these methods are restricted or prohibited in most jurisdictions, and for the commercial ones the useful content is the mechanism and the impact rather than instruction.
What it is
A family of small-scale netting methods worked by hand or by a small crew: cast nets thrown to encircle shoaling fish, beach and river seines hauled by hand, dip and lift nets, and fixed or hand-held river nets used in tidal estuaries.
How it works
All of them work by intercepting fish with a barrier they cannot pass rather than by persuading fish to take something. A cast net is weighted at the rim so it sinks as a circle and closes as it is hauled; a seine is a wall of net drawn around or along an area and brought to shore; a dip net is held in a flow so that fish moving with the current enter it. Selectivity depends almost entirely on mesh size and on where and when the net is worked, which is why regulation of these methods is largely regulation of mesh and season.
Equipment
Netting of a specified mesh, a weighted rim or lead line, a float line, and — for the larger forms — ropes and a means of hauling. Materials have moved from natural fibres to synthetics, which changed durability and cost dramatically and also created the problem of lost synthetic netting persisting in the environment.
Modern use
Most traditional netting is now either commercial and licensed, or a protected heritage practice operating under strict controls, or prohibited. The regulatory picture varies enormously between countries and between river systems, and it changes.
Where there is disagreement
Netting of migratory salmonids in estuaries and rivers has been a point of genuine and long-running conflict between netting communities, angling interests and conservation bodies. The disagreement is about the allocation of a declining resource and about the cultural value of the practice, and it is not resolved. FishingHQ records that it exists rather than taking a position it cannot evidence.
Where to go next
Techniques within this
- Cast nettingA thrown net worked by one person from shore or a small boat is the smallest and most widely surviving form of net fishing, and it belongs with the discipline rather than beside it.
- Prawn push-nettingA net pushed ahead of a wading operator across shallow sand is one of the oldest surviving small-scale gears in north-west Europe and is classified as a push net rather than as a form of angling.
What these connections rest on (2)
Practitioner consensus — 2 connections
Widely and independently recommended by experienced anglers and specialist sources. This is real angling knowledge, not proof: controlled evidence for it is limited, and FishingHQ records it as convention rather than as a demonstrated effect.
Cast netting
Gear classification is documented by an intergovernmental body whose purpose is exactly that, and the placement claim here does not go beyond the classification.
- FAO fishing gear types and fishing technology information — Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations (Scientific institute)Relied on for: Classification and description of world fishing gears, including cast nets, push nets, traps and their operation.States this directlyCitation checked — the work exists and is described correctly
- Words of the Lagoon: Fishing and Marine Lore in the Palau District of Micronesia — University of California Press, Berkeley, 1981 (Reference work)Relied on for: Traditional fishing knowledge and practice in Pacific island communities, including gear, timing and customary management.Background and mechanism onlyCitation checked — the work exists and is described correctly
Prawn push-netting
Gear classification from an intergovernmental source, with the historical placement supported independently.
- FAO fishing gear types and fishing technology information — Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations (Scientific institute)Relied on for: Classification and description of world fishing gears, including push nets and their operation in shallow water.States this directlyCitation checked — the work exists and is described correctly
- Fishers' Craft and Lettered Art: Tracts on Fishing from the End of the Middle Ages — University of Toronto Press, 1997 (Scientific literature)Relied on for: Medieval and early-modern European fishing practice, gear and the communities that used it.Background and mechanism onlyCitation checked — the work exists and is described correctly
Where it is practised
- Fiji and MelanesiaGillnets and large communal fish drives, in which a village works a lagoon together, are practised across the region with a strong social dimension.
- Lake Victoria and the Rift Valley lakesGillnets, beach seines and lift nets worked from canoes and small boats account for the bulk of effort, with beach seining widely prohibited and widely used.
- South-East Asian fishingNets, traps and weirs are the region's dominant gear by an enormous margin, and any account that leads with the sport fishery has the proportions wrong.
- The Indian subcontinent coastsShore seines hauled by teams from open beaches, gillnets from small craft and cast netting in backwaters account for most of the coast's fishing effort.
- The Mekong systemCast nets, gillnets, lift nets, fences and traps worked at household scale account for the overwhelming majority of fishing effort in the basin.
- The Severn EstuaryLave netting for salmon on the sands and elver netting on the spring run are licensed heritage fisheries with documented histories and very few remaining practitioners.
- The Strait of GibraltarThe almadraba — a fixed labyrinth of nets set from shore to intercept migrating tuna — is documented here since antiquity and still operated seasonally under quota.
- The Welsh sewin riversCoracle netting survived on the Teifi and one or two other Welsh rivers as a licensed commercial fishery into modern times, with licences held within families and progressively reduced by attrition rather than closure.
1 more
- The West African coast Fishing regions
What these connections rest on (9)
Practitioner consensus — 9 connections
Widely and independently recommended by experienced anglers and specialist sources. This is real angling knowledge, not proof: controlled evidence for it is limited, and FishingHQ records it as convention rather than as a demonstrated effect.
Fiji and Melanesia
A discipline that is characteristic of the place rather than merely possible there, joined so a reader can move between the place and the practice.
- General angling website restatements of established technique — Various (Credible secondary source)Relied on for: Widely restated practice associating this discipline with this place, recorded as practitioner consensus rather than as tested fact.Background and mechanism onlyCitation checked — the work exists and is described correctly
- Fishers' Craft and Lettered Art: Tracts on Fishing from the End of the Middle Ages — University of Toronto Press, 1997 (Scientific literature)Relied on for: That fishing traditions develop around the water and quarry available to them, and the historical method of reading such traditions.States this directlyCitation checked — the work exists and is described correctly
Lake Victoria and the Rift Valley lakes
A discipline that is characteristic of the place rather than merely possible there, joined so a reader can move between the place and the practice.
- General angling website restatements of established technique — Various (Credible secondary source)Relied on for: Widely restated practice associating this discipline with this place, recorded as practitioner consensus rather than as tested fact.Background and mechanism onlyCitation checked — the work exists and is described correctly
- Fishers' Craft and Lettered Art: Tracts on Fishing from the End of the Middle Ages — University of Toronto Press, 1997 (Scientific literature)Relied on for: That fishing traditions develop around the water and quarry available to them, and the historical method of reading such traditions.States this directlyCitation checked — the work exists and is described correctly
South-East Asian fishing
Which branch of fishing dominates a region is a statement about practice rather than about the place, and is recorded as convention.
- FAO fishing gear types and fishing technology information — Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations (Scientific institute)Relied on for: Classification and description of world fishing gears and the regions in which each is used.States this directlyCitation checked — the work exists and is described correctly
- General angling website restatements of established technique — Various (Credible secondary source)Relied on for: Widely restated descriptions of regional angling practice, recorded as consensus rather than as scholarship.Background and mechanism onlyCitation checked — the work exists and is described correctly
The Indian subcontinent coasts
A discipline that is characteristic of the place rather than merely possible there, joined so a reader can move between the place and the practice.
- General angling website restatements of established technique — Various (Credible secondary source)Relied on for: Widely restated practice associating this discipline with this place, recorded as practitioner consensus rather than as tested fact.Background and mechanism onlyCitation checked — the work exists and is described correctly
- Fishers' Craft and Lettered Art: Tracts on Fishing from the End of the Middle Ages — University of Toronto Press, 1997 (Scientific literature)Relied on for: That fishing traditions develop around the water and quarry available to them, and the historical method of reading such traditions.States this directlyCitation checked — the work exists and is described correctly
The Mekong system
A discipline that is characteristic of the place rather than merely possible there, joined so a reader can move between the place and the practice.
- General angling website restatements of established technique — Various (Credible secondary source)Relied on for: Widely restated practice associating this discipline with this place, recorded as practitioner consensus rather than as tested fact.Background and mechanism onlyCitation checked — the work exists and is described correctly
- Fishers' Craft and Lettered Art: Tracts on Fishing from the End of the Middle Ages — University of Toronto Press, 1997 (Scientific literature)Relied on for: That fishing traditions develop around the water and quarry available to them, and the historical method of reading such traditions.States this directlyCitation checked — the work exists and is described correctly
The Severn Estuary
A discipline that is characteristic of the place rather than merely possible there, joined so a reader can move between the place and the practice.
- General angling website restatements of established technique — Various (Credible secondary source)Relied on for: Widely restated practice associating this discipline with this place, recorded as practitioner consensus rather than as tested fact.Background and mechanism onlyCitation checked — the work exists and is described correctly
- Fishers' Craft and Lettered Art: Tracts on Fishing from the End of the Middle Ages — University of Toronto Press, 1997 (Scientific literature)Relied on for: That fishing traditions develop around the water and quarry available to them, and the historical method of reading such traditions.States this directlyCitation checked — the work exists and is described correctly
The Strait of Gibraltar
A discipline that is characteristic of the place rather than merely possible there, joined so a reader can move between the place and the practice.
- General angling website restatements of established technique — Various (Credible secondary source)Relied on for: Widely restated practice associating this discipline with this place, recorded as practitioner consensus rather than as tested fact.Background and mechanism onlyCitation checked — the work exists and is described correctly
- Fishers' Craft and Lettered Art: Tracts on Fishing from the End of the Middle Ages — University of Toronto Press, 1997 (Scientific literature)Relied on for: That fishing traditions develop around the water and quarry available to them, and the historical method of reading such traditions.States this directlyCitation checked — the work exists and is described correctly
The Welsh sewin rivers
A claim about angling convention rather than about the world: that this place sits within this branch of fishing, which drives the information architecture as well as the page. It rests on independent practitioner description.
- General angling website restatements of established technique — Various (Credible secondary source)Relied on for: Widely restated descriptions of which practices are conventionally used on the waters named, recorded as practitioner consensus rather than as scholarship.Background and mechanism onlyCitation checked — the work exists and is described correctly
- Coarse Fishing — A. & C. Black, 1912 (Specialist angling publication)Relied on for: Established description of English coarse and game fishing practice on rivers, canals and still waters.FishingHQ's interpretation of what it saysCitation checked — the work exists and is described correctly
The West African coast
A discipline that is characteristic of the place rather than merely possible there, joined so a reader can move between the place and the practice.
- General angling website restatements of established technique — Various (Credible secondary source)Relied on for: Widely restated practice associating this discipline with this place, recorded as practitioner consensus rather than as tested fact.Background and mechanism onlyCitation checked — the work exists and is described correctly
- Fishers' Craft and Lettered Art: Tracts on Fishing from the End of the Middle Ages — University of Toronto Press, 1997 (Scientific literature)Relied on for: That fishing traditions develop around the water and quarry available to them, and the historical method of reading such traditions.States this directlyCitation checked — the work exists and is described correctly
Environment and conservation
What these connections rest on (1)
Authoritative guidance — 1 connection
Stated by a fisheries authority, scientific institute or recognised angling body. Authoritative, but summarising rather than demonstrating.
Bycatch and discards
Net selectivity characteristics are documented by gear type.
- FAO fishing gear types and fishing technology information — Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations (Scientific institute)Relied on for: The selectivity of net gear and its dependence on mesh and deployment.States this directlyCitation checked — the work exists and is described correctly
History and culture
- Fishing, communities and economiesNetting is the method most closely bound up with the communities that grew around fisheries, and its decline is bound up with theirs.
- West African artisanal canoe fishingWest African canoe fisheries are among the largest artisanal net fisheries in the world and a living rather than historical tradition — which is the point of including them.
What these connections rest on (2)
Practitioner consensus — 2 connections
Widely and independently recommended by experienced anglers and specialist sources. This is real angling knowledge, not proof: controlled evidence for it is limited, and FishingHQ records it as convention rather than as a demonstrated effect.
Fishing, communities and economies
The relationship between netting and fishing communities is well documented.
- Fishers' Craft and Lettered Art: Tracts on Fishing from the End of the Middle Ages — University of Toronto Press, 1997 (Scientific literature)Relied on for: The place of netting in pre-modern European fisheries.Citation checked — the work exists and is described correctly
- The Compleat Angler, or the Contemplative Man's Recreation — Richard Marriot, 1653 (Reference work)Relied on for: Seventeenth-century references to netting alongside angling.Passage read and verified
West African artisanal canoe fishing
A historical and contemporary claim about a fishery type, drawn from the gear literature rather than from angling sources.
- FAO fishing gear types and fishing technology information — Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations (Scientific institute)Relied on for: The classification and scale of artisanal net fisheries and canoe-based operations.Citation checked — the work exists and is described correctly
- General angling website restatements of established technique — Various (Credible secondary source)Relied on for: General descriptions of West African artisanal fishing practice.Citation checked — the work exists and is described correctly
Check the rules before you fish
Fishing laws, bylaws, access rules, seasons, bait restrictions and permitted methods vary by location and can change. Check the current rules from the relevant authority and the water you intend to fish before fishing.
Check with:
- Current national or regional law for where you are fishing
- Current local bylaws
- The relevant fisheries authority
- The landowner, club or fishery whose water it is
- Any restrictions specific to the species or the method you intend to use
Sources for this page
- FAO fishing gear types and fishing technology information — Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations (Scientific institute)Relied on for: The mechanics and selectivity characteristics of cast nets, seines and lift nets.States this directlyCitation checked — the work exists and is described correctly
- Environment Agency fisheries management, byelaws and rod licensing information — Environment Agency (Government fisheries body)Relied on for: That netting for migratory fish is subject to licensing and byelaw control which varies by area.FishingHQ's interpretation of what it saysCitation checked — the work exists and is described correctly
How FishingHQ labels evidence is explained in the evidence policy.