There aren’t many fishermen who haven’t had problems with having their lines tangled with the lines of nearby anglers. Incidents such as this are not unusual and, unfortunately, can cause some rather expensive and unfriendly exchanges between fishermen.

Trolling anglers in both freshwater and saltwater are familiar with the multiple rod holders that enable fishermen to drag lines off the stern as the boat moves forward. It really doesn’t take much imagination to see how even a single boat can tangle multiple lines easily. When you begin to add more lines off the stern, as many anglers are now doing, line tangles become even more frequent. Add in crowded waterways with restricted maneuvering and side planning boards that enable fishermen to spread their lures over a huge swath of water and----Well, tempers can start flaring.

Shouting matches between fishermen and recreational boaters aren’t unusual whether you’re on Lake Jordan or trolling for mackerel off Cape Lookout. Most of us have seen this happen at one time or another. Even when fishermen are dragging as few as two lines it’s not unusual for another boater to cut all the lines as they motor close across your stern. At the price of tackle these days those incidents can get expensive as well as frustrating.

I’ve fished on recreational boats that were trolling as many as 16 lines at a time off the stern. Side-planers and down-planers enable fishermen to spread the area covered by their lures out over a huge area at the same time

Not only do horrific tangles happen when other fishermen get too close with their lines but a hooked fish cutting across all the other lines cause tangles. Add in the use of the so-called “umbrella rigs” with multiple lures on the end of some of the lines, you may be looking at using the better part of an hour to clear your lines.

One angler may (technically) have the right of way over another angler but it may make more sense to yield when trolling at a slow speed instead of proceeding on your set course.

Tangled lines on individual boats are going to happen and that’s to be expected. When trolling several lines even a sudden turn can put lines together. What can save fishermen a lot of trouble is simply exhibiting some common sense and applying the golden rule when interacting with other anglers. The rules of navigation may state one thing but sometimes common sense afloat trumps the written rules.

While recently fishing for big striped bass on the Chesapeake Bay we were trolling in a huge amount of open water. We were close to some major population centers and boats were thick on the water that day. I’ve heard fishing that section of the Chesapeake described as being “Grand Central Station on the water.” Fishing rods stuck out from recreational boats like quills on a porcupine’s back everywhere you looked. To further complicate matters, most of these boats were pulling elaborate side-planers with multiple lines attached. Each of the trolling rigs like this would cut a swath through the water of maybe 100 yards. To even more complicate matters, these boats usually were pulling various types of down-planers to cover different depths in their trolling pattern.

Trolling under tight conditions like this is definitely a two-man job. You need a captain to watch where the boat was heading and another man to act as mate and man the fishing rods.

When a fish struck it was a hectic effort for two people to pull in the other lines to keep from getting tangles. If you were “lucky” enough to have multiple hits at the same time, then it really turned into a mad scramble. If another boat pulled in too close to watch the action you were having, you could just about count on some other boat’s lines adding to the tangled mess.

With all this technology available to recreational anglers, it can get pretty complicated at times. In our haste to put more and bigger fish in the boat, we seem to have created a monster. Add in crowded waterways and the problems seem to increase even more.

With the exception of weekend fishing and boating on some inland lakes near population centers and concentrations of fish in some salt waters, we’re darned lucky to have a lot of open water still available to fish and boat on here in North Carolina. If you time your boating and fishing activities to miss the crowds and use common sense and angling etiquette afloat, a lot of problems can be avoided.

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Several fishermen have called and complained about just how complicated fishing has become on our salt waters these days. It’s easy to see why some are simply turning away from this sport and taking up golfing. Over complicated rules for outdoorsmen could well be part of the reason that sportsmen are turning to other recreations.

In an effort to more closely manage our marine resources, new laws and regulations seem to be “coming out of the woodwork every day.” Saltwater fishermen (commercial and recreational) need to constantly check what new proclamations the N.C. Division of Marine Fisheries has issued in order to stay within the legal limits set by the international, national, state and even local bureaucrats.

One fisherman stated that, “I can’t believe that the DMF has now required that we list our phone number with them before we can buy our saltwater fishing license. Now they’re telling us what kind of tackle we have to use in saltwater and even requiring snapper and grouper fishermen to have a unhooking device on board when fishing for most of the offshore bottom fish. It’s like we have to have an attorney on the boat to tell us what we can or can’t do.”

The somewhat salty angler then continued to say that he was “more than capable to unhook his own grouper and snapper without any mechanical tool. I hold the fish with one hand and use my other hand to hold its mouth open while using my middle finger to pull the hook out. If the warden wants to see my unhooking device, I’ll gladly extend my clenched, unhooking hand to him and wiggle my extended middle finger to demonstrate exactly how it works.”

If people are upset about the proposed new health care regulations infringing on us, maybe they should take a long look at how many and confusing our hunting and fishing regulations and laws too . Sometime we Americans are capable of making decisions for ourselves without having OUR government manage our lives for us. We do have some degree of common sense.

As one very well known federal game warden once told me, “We can make all the laws and regulations we want to but if the hunters and fishermen don’t believe in them, they won’t obey them.” If most outdoorsmen are educated as to why certain practices afield really help conserve our natural resources, they’ll usually adopt these practices without having unnecessary and confusing laws enacted.