Hook-and-line is a general term used for a range of fishing methods that employ short fishing lines with hooks in one form or another (as opposed to long-lines). It includes hand-lines, hand-reels, powered reels, rod/pole-and-line, drop lines,...

Long-lines consist of short lines (called snoods) carrying baited hooks, attached at regular intervals to a longer main line that is laid on the bottom or suspended horizontally with the help of surface floats. Main lines can be over 150 km long...

Long-lines consist of short lines (called snoods) carrying hooks, attached at regular intervals to a longer main line that is laid on, or close to, the seabed. Main lines are up to 150 km long and can carry several thousand hooks.

Pelagic gillnets or ‘set nets’ are fine-filament nets that are kept at or below the surface by numerous floats and weights and held in position by anchors. If a fish’s head goes through the net but its body can’t follow, it is ‘gilled’ or...

Bottom gillnets or ‘set nets’ are fine-filament nets, the lower edge of which touch the seabed, and are held in place by numerous floats, weights and anchors. If a fish’s head goes through the net but its body can’t follow, it is ‘gilled’ or...

Fish are encircled by a large ‘wall’ of net, which is then brought together to retain the fish by using a line at the bottom that enables the net to be closed like a purse.

The front net sections are often made of very large meshes or ropes, which herd the fish towards the back of the funnel-shaped net. Pelagic trawls may be towed by one or two (pair trawl) boats.

A fishing net, similar to a small trawl net, with a conical net bag with two relatively long wings. Two long heavy ropes, one attached to each wing, are used to encircle a large area of the seabed to herd the fish into the net and then to haul...

A type of bottom trawl in which the horizontal opening of the net is provided by a heavy beam mounted at each end on guides or skids that travel along the seabed. On sandy or muddy bottoms, a series of ‘tickler’ chains are strung between the...