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A fisher or fisherman is someone who captures
fish Fish are Aquatic animal, aquatic, craniate, gill-bearing animals that lack Limb (anatomy), limbs with Digit (anatomy), digits. Included in this definition are the living hagfish, lampreys, and Chondrichthyes, cartilaginous and bony fish as we ...
and other animals from a body of water, or gathers shellfish. Worldwide, there are about 38 million commercial and subsistence fishers and fish farmers. Fishers may be professional or
recreational Recreation is an activity of leisure, leisure being discretionary time. The "need to do something for recreation" is an essential element of human biology and psychology. Recreational activities are often done for enjoyment, amusement, or pleas ...
. Fishing has existed as a means of obtaining food since the Mesolithic period.Early humans followed the coast
BBC News articles


History

Fishing has existed as a means of obtaining food since the Mesolithic period. Fishing had become a major means of survival as well as a business venture. Fishing and the fishers have also influenced Ancient Egyptian religion; mullets were worshipped as a sign of the arriving flood season. Bastet was often manifested in the form of a
catfish Catfish (or catfishes; order Siluriformes or Nematognathi) are a diverse group of ray-finned fish. Named for their prominent barbels, which resemble a cat's whiskers, catfish range in size and behavior from the three largest species alive, ...
. In ancient Egyptian literature, the process that Amun used to create the world is associated with the tilapia's method of mouth-brooding.


Commerce

According to the FAO, there were about 39 million fishers in countries producing more than 200,000 tonnes in 2012, which is nearly 140% the number in 1995. The total fishery production of 66 million tonnes equated to an average productivity of 3.5 tonnes per person. Most of this growth took place in
Asia Asia (, ) is one of the world's most notable geographical regions, which is either considered a continent in its own right or a subcontinent of Eurasia, which shares the continental landmass of Afro-Eurasia with Africa. Asia covers an are ...
n countries, where four-fifths of world fishers and fish farmers dwell. FAO
''Fishing people''
Retrieved 7 July 2008.
Most fishers are women and men involved in offshore and deep-sea fisheries. Women and men fish in some regions inshore from small boats or collect shellfish and seaweed. In many artisanal fishing communities, women or men are responsible for making and repairing nets, post-harvest
processing Processing is a free graphical library and integrated development environment (IDE) built for the electronic arts, new media art, and visual design communities with the purpose of teaching non-programmers the fundamentals of computer programming ...
and
marketing Marketing is the process of exploring, creating, and delivering value to meet the needs of a target market in terms of goods and services; potentially including selection of a target audience; selection of certain attributes or themes to emph ...
.


Recreation

Recreational fishing is fishing for pleasure or competition. It can be contrasted with commercial fishing, which is fishing for economic profit, or
subsistence fishing Artisanal fishing (or traditional/subsistence fishing) consists of various small-scale, low-technology, low-capital, fishing practices undertaken by individual fishing households (as opposed to commercial fishing). Many of these households are o ...
, which is fishing for survival. The most common form of recreational fishing is done with a rod, reel, line, hooks and any one of a wide range of
bait Bait may refer to: General * Bait (luring substance), bait as a luring substance ** Fishing bait, bait used for fishing Film * ''Bait'' (1950 film), a British crime film by Frank Richardson * ''Bait'' (1954 film), an American noir film by Hugo ...
s. Lures are frequently used in place of bait. Some people make handmade lures, including plastic lures and artificial flies. The practice of catching or attempting to catch fish with a hook is called angling, and fishermen using this technique are sometimes referred to as ''anglers''. When angling, it is sometimes expected or required that the fish be caught and released.
Big-game fishing Big-game fishing, also known as offshore sportfishing, offshore gamefishing or blue-water fishing, is a form of recreational fishing targeting large game fish, usually done on a large body of water such as the ocean. History Big-game fishing ...
is fishing from boats to catch large open-water species such as tuna,
shark Sharks are a group of elasmobranch fish characterized by a cartilaginous skeleton, five to seven gill slits on the sides of the head, and pectoral fins that are not fused to the head. Modern sharks are classified within the clade Selachi ...
s and marlin.
Noodling Noodling is fishing for catfish using one's bare hands, and is practiced primarily in the southern United States. The noodler places their hand inside a discovered catfish hole in order to catch the fish. Other names for the same activity are ...
and trout tickling are also recreational activities.


Communities

For some communities, fishing provides not only a source of food and work but also
community A community is a social unit (a group of living things) with commonality such as place, norms, religion, values, customs, or identity. Communities may share a sense of place situated in a given geographical area (e.g. a country, village, t ...
and cultural identity.International Collective in Support of Fishworkers (ICSF)
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Safety issues

The
fishing industry The fishing industry includes any industry or activity concerned with taking, culturing, processing, preserving, storing, transporting, marketing or selling fish or fish products. It is defined by the Food and Agriculture Organization as including ...
is hazardous for fishers. Between 1992 and 1999, US commercial fishing vessels averaged 78 deaths per year. The main contributors to fatalities are: FAObr>Profile for the USA
* inadequate preparation for emergencies * poor vessel maintenance and inadequate safety equipment * lack of awareness of or ignoring stability issues. Many fishers, while accepting that fishing is dangerous, staunchly defend their independence. Many proposed laws and additional regulation to increase safety have been defeated because fishers oppose them. Alaska's commercial fishers work in one of the world's harshest environments. Many of the hardships they endure include isolated fishing grounds, high winds, seasonal darkness, very cold water, icing, and short fishing seasons, where very long work days are the norm. Fatigue, physical stress, and financial pressures face most Alaska fishers through their careers. Out of 948 work-related deaths that took place in Alaska during 1990–2006, one-third (311) occurred to fishermen. This is equivalent to an estimated annual fatality rate of 128/100,000 workers/year. This fatality rate is 26 times that of the overall U.S. work-related fatality rate of approximately 5/100,000 workers/year for the same time period. While the work-related fatality rate for commercial fishers in Alaska is still very high, it does appear to be decreasing: since 1990, there has been a 51 percent decline in the annual fatality rate. The successes in commercial fishing are due in part to the U.S. Coast Guard implementing new safety requirements in the early 1990s. These safety requirements contributed to 96 percent of the commercial fishers surviving vessel sinkings/capsizings in 2004, whereas in 1991, only 73 percent survived. While the number of occupational deaths in commercial fishers in Alaska has been reduced, there is a continuing pattern of losing 20 to 40 vessels every year. There are still about 100 fishers who must be rescued each year from cold Alaska waters. Successful rescue is still dependent on the expertly trained personnel of the US Coast Guard Search and Rescue operations, and such efforts can be hindered by the harshness of seas and the weather. Furthermore, the people involved in Search and Rescue operations are themselves at considerable risk for injury or death during these rescue attempts.


Gallery

File:Fisherman and his catch Seychelles.jpg, A fisherman and his catch, including small sharks, hooked on hand lines miles offshore in the
Seychelles Seychelles (, ; ), officially the Republic of Seychelles (french: link=no, République des Seychelles; Creole: ''La Repiblik Sesel''), is an archipelagic state consisting of 115 islands in the Indian Ocean. Its capital and largest city, ...
File:TraditionalFisherman1Ice.JPG, Traditional Icelandic fisherman File:Shrimpers on horseback.jpg, Belgium shrimpers on horseback File:Banks shrimper.jpg, English shrimper with pushnet File:Isla Juan Fernandez- Langostas (Lobsters).jpg, Chilean fishermen with
lobsters Lobsters are a family (Nephropidae, synonym Homaridae) of marine crustaceans. They have long bodies with muscular tails and live in crevices or burrows on the sea floor. Three of their five pairs of legs have claws, including the first pair, ...
File:Fishing trawlers(Malpe).JPG, Indian fisherman File:Long Island fisherman.jpg,
Long Island Long Island is a densely populated island in the southeastern region of the U.S. state of New York, part of the New York metropolitan area. With over 8 million people, Long Island is the most populous island in the United States and the 18 ...
fisherman File:Woman_fishing_in_Don_Det,_Laos.jpg, Woman fishing in Laos


See also

*
Fishing Fishing is the activity of trying to catch fish. Fish are often caught as wildlife from the natural environment, but may also be caught from fish stocking, stocked bodies of water such as fish pond, ponds, canals, park wetlands and reservoirs. ...
* Recreational fishing * Aquaculture *
Fish farming upright=1.3, Salmon farming in the sea (mariculture) at Loch Ainort, Isle of Skye">mariculture.html" ;"title="Salmon farming in the sea (mariculture">Salmon farming in the sea (mariculture) at Loch Ainort, Isle of Skye, Scotland Fish farming o ...
* Dirty, dangerous and demeaning * Fishery *
List of American fishers This is a list of American fishers, denoting fishers who have been involved in various aspects of fishing, commercial fishing and recreational fishing. American fishers * Joseph H. Acklen * Ted Ames – a Maine fisherman, and former hatcher ...


References


Further reading

* Fields, Leslie Leyland (editor) (2002) ''Out On The Deep Blue: Women, Men, and the Oceans They Fish.'' St. Martin's Press. * Jones, Stephen (2001) ''Working Thin Waters: Conversations with Captain * Lawrence H. Malloy, Jr''. University Press of New England.


External links

* Moore, Charles W (1998
Did fishermen discover the New World?''

For Those in Peril: Dangers at Sea for fishermen on the East Coast of Scotland
historyshelf.org

North East Folklore Archive, Aberdeenshire Council. Retrieved 9 March 2011. {{Authority control Fishers Food services occupations Marine occupations