What are the methods for catching wild eels? A complete guide to fishing, netting and catching techniques
Eel, also known as yellow eel (Monopterus albus), is also called long fish or scaleless gentleman.
Eel is warm and sweet in nature, with an extremely high protein content. I only learned all this later after reading books.
When we were kids we didn't care about nutrition or anything like that, we just knew how to eat, and whatever we caught, we ate. In that era of relative material scarcity, eels could satisfy our craving and fill our bellies.
When we ate yellow eels, we mostly caught them ourselves, rarely spent money to buy them, and didn't have that spare money anyway.
There are many ways to catch yellow eels:
The first is “digging for yellow eels”
Find the eel hole and dig with an iron shovel, going straight for the target. This method works in all four seasons and is suitable for both young and old.
The second is “setting yellow eel traps”
After the fields are flooded and rice seedlings are transplanted, along the ditches and field ridges, every ten meters or so, throw in an eel trap containing earthworms, set them in the evening and collect them in the early morning. The eel trap is right-angled, with the opening large on the outside and small on the inside, easy to enter but hard to exit, and because of the angle, with a yellow eel's intelligence it is very hard to escape, just like a fly that only knows to dart toward the window, completely unaware that glass is blocking it, and is absolutely unable to fly out; in fact, in most cases, the main entrance is just a step away, and if it could try a different angle, the problem would be solved instantly. But yellow eels, like industry, ultimately cannot outmatch humans, so they naturally cannot escape the misfortune of being captured and killed. Humans can therefore feel quite proud of themselves. Because there are a great many eel traps, although it is wide sowing and thin harvesting, the final harvest is still not small.
The third is “flushing out yellow eels”
Find an eel hole with a rear opening, and use either hands or feet to create artificial high water pressure, forcefully squeezing into the eel hole. The yellow eel, suddenly suffering a terrifying attack, mostly flees for its life. Once driven out of the hole, you can easily capture it by extending your middle finger.
The fourth is “shining for yellow eels”
Hold a torch in the left hand (using diesel or kerosene, placed in a container, connected by a thin iron tube, with cotton yarn or old cloth wrapped around the head), and hold bamboo tongs in the right hand (made from bamboo strips, with a hole drilled in the middle, fastened with a bolt, and the tips made serrated). Search along one field ridge after another. Yellow eels like to come out at night to feed, and when suddenly seeing firelight, they are often at a loss, so aim at the vital spot and extend the tongs to clamp them, with an extremely high success rate.
The fifth is electrofishing for yellow eels
Prepare a homemade battery pack and a miner's lamp, and just like shining for yellow eels, it is all done at night. When traces of yellow eels are found, reach into the water, turn on the power, and the yellow eels immediately faint briefly; you only need to pick them into the basket.
The sixth is following the tractor
After the wheat harvest, the large fields are about to be flooded, and some plots are used for cultivating rice, called seedling fields. When the season comes, a tractor is used to plow the fields, and a bunch of kids follow behind; in the plowed sections, yellow eels and loaches often appear, and those with sharp eyes and quick hands can catch them. But after half a day, everyone has become a mud doll; fortunately, the weather is also hot, so you dive into the river and wash clean.