Pond Boss Forums MANAGING AN EXISTING POND Feeding Sense of smell in fish.

Hello.

One says that fish have a strong sense of smell, that smell is more developed than sight and much more developed than human.

What do you think, have there already been experiments for fishing or their food.

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I believe sense of smell will vary between fish species. For instance, fish that are more common in turbid water or hunt at night will probably have a more developed sense of smell than fish that sight hunt in the daytime.

Don't rule out vibrations and the lateral line in fish.

sense of smell or taste? have been told that some fish can sense amino acids of prey and food with barbells like catfish and through the skin on others. Curious.

There is a lot we don't know about fish senses. That includes the fish brain which is the center of "senses". They most likely don't work the way we humans anticipate. For example when some fish started evolving to live out of the water there is a lot they might have considered (assuming their brain worked that way). However they could not have envisioned fire because there was no background for the concept in the world they came from.

If I remember correctly, the genetic package necessary for animal life on land appeared tens of millions of years before land animals did. Obviously, it was costly to carry around such a complex package of instructions that had little or no utility through all those generations. One of many examples of foresight in biological processes.

https://www.science.org/news/2021/0...land-while-they-were-still-swimming-seas

Hello.

Have you ever tried attractants, several companies have.

I'm going to try a trap with garlic, and another trap with sardine oil, to take minnows or crayfish.

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How will you hold the "smell" in the trap? I can see crushing garlic and putting it in say a piece of panty hose, but the sardine oil?

Maybe a clear bottle, turned upside down once it's in the water to hold the oil in the bottle? Or a piece of cloth soaked in the oil?

I can catch minnows and crayfish in a minnow trap with nothing at all in it. You'd have to do a couple of tests, like with a bare trap and an unscented trap with what you are using to hold the oil or garlic to make sure that it is the smell alone that is doing the attracting.

Hello.

I always trap my minnows and crayfish without problems, but it's always fun to try something else. For the oil, I use like you said a piece of cloth soaked in the oil, next time I will make a very little hole in the can and put it in the trap, also I will try your idea.

I just checked my trap with garlic after 2 hours the trap is full of minnows, if the garlic does not attract them, it does not scare them away.

I can't wait to see tomorrow morning if Garlic and oil attracts Crayfish.
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That's pretty cool. Do you just peel the garlic cloves or mash them?