Fishing is many people's favorite summer pastime.  Do you want to go fishing with your family or your friends, but you do not know much about it?  If so, you have come to the right place!  This webquest will teach you all about fish, fishing, storing and preparing fish, and the health aspects of eating fish.  You will learn about these topics by exploring the resources provided in this webquest.  At the end of the webquest, you will be so smart about fishing that you will make your own fishing plan which you can take with you on your next fishing trip.  Pair up with a parent or someone else who knows a lot about fishing; that person will evaluate your fishing plan and go fishing with you at the end of the webquest.  When you are ready to begin, check out the sections below!

Step One: Learn about types of fish, their habitats, their anatomy, and their behavior.

Before you head out to the shoreline with your fishing pole, tackle, and bait, you need to know something about the fish you will be trying to catch.  You should be able to identify different types of fish, understand their anatomy, and know something about the way they behave.  After all, how can you catch a fish if you don't know what it looks like or where it spends most of its time? This webquest focuses on fish found in lakes, rivers, and streams in the Midwestern United States.

  • The Indiana Department of Natural Resources (DNR) offers a great website to teach you how to identify the types of fish people usually fish for in the Midwest.  Check it out here, and carefully examine the photos and descriptions.
  •  The Michigan Department of Natural Resources also offers a helpful fish identification web page. Check it out here, and click on the names of fish to see many detailed photos of the fish.
  • Yahoo!Kids has a great fish directory.  Click on names of the fish to see pictures and find out basic facts.
  • To learn fish anatomy, take a look at this page provided by the Florida Fish and Wildlife Conservation Commission.  It gives detailed diagrams and descriptions of internal and external fish anatomy.  Here is another web page describing fish anatomy, from KentuckyLake.com.  Look carefully at the anatomy.  You may need to know this information later, when learning how to clean and prepare fish.
  • Now you need to learn some basic facts about fish habitats and behavior. It's pretty hard to catch fish if you don't know where they hang out, what they like to eat, and how they behave. Yahoo!Kids has a great website on how fish nest and reproduce.  They also have a website about how fish defend themselves, and one about the senses fish use to navigate, catch food, and find mates.  The web site What's a Fish, from Australia's NSW Department of Primary Industries, provides basic fish facts for kids.

 
Step Two: Learn about how to set up your fishing pole, cast your line, reel it in, use different fishing techniques, and obey fishing rules.
 
Now that you have learned to identify many types of fish, you know their anatomy, and you know something about their behavior and habitats, you are ready to learn something about fishing.

  • First, you need to learn how to set up a fishing pole, cast your line, set the hook, and reel your line in.  This interactive cartoon web page, provided by americaoutdoors.com, will help you learn all of those basics.
  • Check out this website for more fishing instructions, including close-up diagrams showing you how to tie the knot to hold your hook on the line.  Use the links on the left (Fishing Gear, Knots, Rigs, Baits, Fishing Safety, Casting, and Cleaning Fish) to navigate through the website.  This website contains LOTS of information!
  • NestleWaters has a great how-to-fishing-guide for kids! Read the guide here.  It has all sorts of useful information, such as a table containing the best baits to catch certain types of fish.  Use the red and blue buttons on the left side of the page to read everything.
  • Each state has its own fishing rules. You may not be able to keep every fish you catch, because their are limits on size and number for many types of fish.  For instance, you can find Indiana's fishing rules on page 44 of the Indiana Recreation and Fishing Guide, which is published by the Indiana DNR.  If you live in another state, find the website for your Department of Natural Resources or your Department of Fish and Wildlife.  That website should tell you the fishing rules for your state.  Also, while children do not usually need fishing licenses, your adult fishing buddy will need one. You should be able to find out how and where to get a fishing license from the same website containing the other fishing rules.  These rules can be hard to understand, so don't be afraid to ask an adult for help in understanding them!

 

Step Three: Learn how to store, clean, and prepare fish, and learn about health benefits and risks of eating fish.
 
If you decide to keep any of the fish you catch, you will need to know how to store them, clean them, and prepare them.  You will also want to know some of the health facts about eating different types of fish. The resources below will help you.  
  • The first step after catching a fish is storing it until you are ready to clean it and prepare it to eat. This may be done a number of ways.  One of those ways is by putting the fish on a stringer.  A stringer is looped through the fish's gill opening and out of the mouth, and then you put the fish back into the water with the other end of the stringer tied to a branch, rock, or other heavy object.  Another storage method is a fish basket.  These come in a variety of shapes and sizes.  No matter what the shape or size, you put the fish in the basket after catching it, and put the basket in the water, with a rope tied to the basket and anchored to something on shore or in your boat.  After you are finished fishing, if you need to drive a while before cleaning the fish, you will want to store them in an ice-filled cooler.
  • For information about cleaning fish, check out this portion of one of the websites at which we looked before.  Please note that you will need the help of your adult fishing buddy to clean fish. In order to clean fish, a very sharp knife, called a fillet (pronounced "fil-ay") knife is used.  Even experienced adult fishers can seriously injure themselves with this knife.  So, don't risk it! Wait until you are older to try cleaning the fish yourself. If your adult fishing buddy needs more information on cleaning and filleting ("fil-ay-ing") fish, tell him or her to check out this site from about.com or this site from the Ohio Division of Wildlife.
  • Now comes the really fun part of all of this: cooking and eating your fish! Here is a website that will help you out with the basics of cooking fish.  You will learn different techniques for cooking fish, like baking, pan-frying, and steaming them. If you caught a catfish, this website gives plenty of recipes for cooking them.  If you caught a bass, check out these recipes.  If you caught bluegill or another type of small pan fish, these recipes could be helpful.
  • Last but not least, you will want to know the health benefits and health risks of eating your catch.  Each state publishes a "fish consumption guide" which will tell you which wild-caught fish are safe to eat, and how many servings per week you should eat.  States publish these guides because some water becomes contaminated with chemicals, which means the fish get contaminated, too.  In the Indiana DNR's Recreation and Fishing Guide, you will find this information on page 51.  To find this information for other states, visit that state's Department of Natural Resources website or Department of Fish and Wildlife website. In general, if the waters are not contaminated, fish are very healthy to eat.  If you check out this website, you will see that fish (when baked, steamed, or prepared in pretty much any way except for frying) are very healthy in comparison to many other meats. This article helps explain why fish are healthy; they contain the best type of fat for humans to consume-- unsaturated fat.

 

Step Four: Make your fishing plan, have your adult fishing buddy evaluate it, and go fishing!

  • Now that you have learned all of that useful stuff about fish, fishing, storing fish, preparing fish, and eating them, it's time for you to put your knowledge to the test! Fill out this fishing plan, including as much detail as possible. Remember, your adult fishing buddy is going to evaluate your plan, and then both of you are going to use your plan when you go fishing! You want this plan to be the best you can make it.  Most importantly, have fun fishing!

 

Some Fun Fishing Games:

While you're waiting to go on your real fishing trip, here are some fun online fishing games to keep you busy:

 

Information for Adult Fishing Buddies

First of all, thank you for participating in this webquest with a young fisherman or fisherwoman.  You are helping your young fishing buddy to learn a useful outdoor sport that he or she can enjoy for a lifetime.  Here is some information you may find helpful:

  • Although this webquest is designed with kids in mind, the kids may find some of the resources difficult to understand on their own. For instance, the Department of Natural Resources did not write their Recreation and Fishing Guide with children in mind; that information cannot be found elsewhere, however.  Be ready to help kids out by helping them read the tougher resources provided in this webquest.
  • Although I included a section in this webquest with information about cleaning and preparing fish, I made it clear that kids should not attempt these tasks by themselves. Kids can still learn a lot about these tasks by watching you, their adult fishing buddy, do them.
  • As I was searching for fishing advice for kids, I found many websites for adults containing great advice about taking children fishing. The Ohio Division of Wildlife offers some great tips on taking kids fishing.  ESPN also offers some great tips.  There is also a great article on about.com about teaching kids to fish.  Try searching for "taking kids fishing" "teaching kids to fish" or "kids fishing" using your favorite search engine, and you will find  many more articles along this same line.
  • Your young fishing buddy will be expecting you to evaluate his or her fishing plan at the end of this webquest, and use that plan to go on a fishing trip.  Remember to give praise for the good portions of the plan, and give positive criticism for the portions that need work.  Most of all, have fun fishing together!

 

About this Webquest

This webquest was written by Angela Eck, a student at Indiana University School of Library and Information Science-Indianapolis.  Angela will soon earn her Masters of Library and Information Science degree.  She currently works part time at her local public library, in the children's department.  She hopes to create a long-lasting career in public library service for children and young adults. This webquest was an assignment for a course called Electronic Materials for Children and Young Adults, taught by Annette Lamb.

 

Last Updated: June 11, 2008