Spearing in Italy (freshwater)

[spaghetti]

Tench from small ponds with still muddy water are not that good, but tench from a large, deep and wavy alpine lake do taste good.

[glowworm]

I'll beleive you about the tench an englishman can't argue with an italian about food.

Had to check up on Burbot and it seems they became extinct in the UK about 50 years ago but there are plans to re-introduce them.

[Diving-Kai83]

Tenches are very delicious in my opinion, with a nice butter sauce a dream!

[Pastor]

Originally Posted by glowworm

I'll beleive you about the tench an englishman can't argue with an italian about food.

Had to check up on Burbot and it seems they became extinct in the UK about 50 years ago but there are plans to re-introduce them.

Burbot are extinct? I'll never believe Izaac Walton again

[glowworm]

Izaac Walton.....i said 50 years

[spaghetti]

..and here I go. I don't have any habit to take pictures of my catches, especially from the lake. But I asked friends and relatives to peek in all cabinets and this is what I found. All fish caught in lake Garda.
1) Winter black bass (caught 3 weeks ago) 1960 grams, shot with my Mares Medisten 8 meters deep
2) Summer black bass shot with my Comanche 60 in just 2 meters. That was pretty big!
3) Summer carp, shot without intention: it appeared from the murk and my finger pulled the trigger without judgement. The fish has been eaten anyway

[foxfish]

Great insight to freshwater spearing, thanks for the pics but I think you should consider taking more even if it only for our benefit.
You do look nice & healthy too

[MaxKuper]

Hi to everybody, I am planning to spend one week at Como Lake in early July. Has anyone heard anything of spearfishing in this lake? I would really appreciate to get some info about viz, hunting depths, water temperature and the best spots for spearfishing in the Como Lake area. Thanx in advance

[spaghetti]

Hi Max.
For regulations they are the same apllying to lake Garda. You need a license (cheap), no scuba, no night hunting, float or buoy necessary, et cetera as specified for Lake Garda.
The visibility is quite short average, you will hunt with a 75cm bandgun and a short pneumatic. There are much more (and easier) tench in lake Como than in lake Garda, while pike and bass are quite rarely spotted. Another fish that you will quite probably find is the Walleye (it looks like between a pike and a perch). You will hunt between 0-15meters, better on kelp beds.
Now, important:
spearfishing is legal only in SOME limited spots.
Here's the the names of places where it's legal on lake Como (you will check them on any local map that's enough detailed):

In the Province of Como:

1- In the town of Musso: all the shoreline within the town limits
2- In the Town of San Siro: from Punta Gaeta to the uotput of the Serio river
3: In the town of Bellagio: from the boat dock at "Punta Spartivento" to the square at Pescallo village.
4 In the towns of Lenno and Tremezzo: from the Azzano boat dock to Balbianello
5-In the towns of Torno and Faggeto Lario: from the boat dock "Pliniana" to the Cantiere Mostes shipyard at Faggeto Lario.
6- In the towns of Cernobbio and Moltrasio: from teh stairway at punta di Pizzo to Villa Fontanelle.

As you see there's not much room for our sport in that Como lake, but anyway if you plan a family trip right there, it's worth bringing your gear and give it a try.


In the Province of Lecco

1- From the port of Parè to Malgrate
2- From Punta di Piona direction south till the warning plates
3- Town of Abadia Lariana Lariana; in a place called Prandello, from a discoteque called Orsa Maggiore direction north to the ex powerplant;

[MaxKuper]

2 Spaghetti,

thank you very much, really appreciate your help. One more question, are there any shops which sell spearfishing gear? that would be very helpful.
Thank you in advance.
Max

[spaghetti]

Originally Posted by MaxKuper

2 Spaghetti,

thank you very much, really appreciate your help. One more question, are there any shops which sell spearfishing gear? that would be very helpful.
Thank you in advance.
Max

okay I'll tell you, but it would help me if you told me where exaclty on lake Como you're planning to settle. It would be cruel of me to suggest you to drive two hours to reach the shop, you know.
For now, lake Como is not exaclty my neck of the woods.
The best specialized shops are in the Milan area.
The very good specialized store called Pepposub is near the highway from Como to Milan
Dove Siamo | Peppo Sub
The very good specialized store Maremania is at Novate Milanese, north of Milan
MAREMANIA TUTTO PER LA SUBACQUEA E LA PESCA IN APNEA Come raggiungerci
a good shop, Sportissimo is in the center of Milan:
Sportissimo Milano - negozio di subacquea a Milano - e-commerce - online

Just consider that if you drive down to Milan it's a bit of a mess with traffic and roads, being that a huge, messy and ugly urban metropolitan area.
I don't know of specalized shops right on the lake. But I remember that in Mandello del Lario, which is a beautiful towns on lake Como, there's a big sports gear outlet store, named "Longoni Sport", with a decent section dedicated to diving gear. So to resume, before you venture driving down to Milan, check Longoni Sport at Mandello del Lario and see if you find there what you're looking for.
Have a nice trip and please feel free to ask for more info

[fleshy]

Nice carp spaghetti! The three main differences I think between fresh and saltwater shooting are these:

1. You don't need as much weight in freshwater.
2. Sitting on the bottom and waiting for fish, or attempting to "lure" fish in rarely works. Where I live we find a school, and then several people dive the deep end of the school and blow bubbles to keep them from all scattering, then the shooter dives down, and takes the shot.
3. Freshwater shooting is usually shallower, but not necessarily, because some people spear on wrecks and the such in the great lakes, and other very deep lakes.

Just because it seems simpler doesn't mean its any less challenging. It just has its own unique challenges to offer. Pastor, we need to get you out here for some good old fashioned Wisconsin spearfishing.

[spaghetti]

Originally Posted by fleshy

Nice carp spaghetti! The three main differences I think between fresh and saltwater shooting are these:
1. You don't need as much weight in freshwater.
2. Sitting on the bottom and waiting for fish, or attempting to "lure" fish in rarely works.
3. Freshwater shooting is usually shallower, but not necessarily, because some people spear on wrecks and the such in the great lakes, and other very deep lakes.
Just because it seems simpler doesn't mean its any less challenging. It just has its own unique challenges to offer.

Thanks. But the largemouth tasted much better!
For the technique thoughts, I can suscribe what you said as general concepts. But of course there would be so much more to say.
Talking for our lakes, it much depends on season, type of bottom and fish targeted.
Every fish here requires a different technique for each season. For example, pikes are very deep in the winter (30 meters or deeper), quite shallow in mid spring (5-8 meters), quite deep in summer (15-30 meters) and still quite shallow at the end of summer/early fall.
They (pikes) never come close with the aspetto technique (while perch, tench and largemouth do sometimes: as you said, it rarely works): in any case you must be sleek and quiet in your approach, and quick to shoot or they will soon give a tail blow and disappear in a cloud of mud: poff! While when they're deep, you must combine the so called dive-bombing technique with agguato. It's not for everyone to freedive 30 meters in 6 or 7°C with zero visibility, and perform a clever agguato. I know some guys who enjoy a lot this type of hunting, and I did it myself sometimes, but personally I'm growing too old for that...
Ok I'm making it too long, but in short what I mean is that we use a lot of different specialized techniques. Including: agguato on kelp beds (summer/fall) and rock beds (winter/early spring), seizing fish through kelp beds, eels in the mud (smmer), eels in the micro-algae that flourish in spring covering the bottom (spring), eels into rocks (fall/winter), burbots under stones (summer), et cetera et cetera et cetera.

[fleshy]

There is SO much more to say, and obviously there are even differences between Europe and north America as far as hunting styles are concerned.
Like you probably hadn't heard of the bubble technique. Thats something Im pretty sure I thought up. It occurred to me while watching "Blue Planet" that killer whales herded fish with bubbles. I also knew that fish would be scared off by bubbles from our snorkels, so I devised this technique to keep large schools of fish in a group. This helped a TON in deep lakes with fast moving fish. The fish were also less scared it seemed by being circled by all the divers, than seeing one, big, consolidated group of divers. If the bottom is somewhat sturdy, you can "play dead" here and with certain kinds of camouflage (my beuchat green mundial works AWESOME) the fish will just forget that threats can come from below, and just start to swim right over you! Oh well, like you I am making this too long, I could talk forever.

[Kinky]

Dear Spaghetti,

You have a lot of info about spearfishing on the lake. I usually go to Ponti sul Mincio a little town in the countryside close to Peschiera del Garda.

I would like to try to spearfishing overthere.

I think that the best period to do that should be the second half of September. Less boats. What do you think?

I read on Apnea Magazine that you can spearfish at 50mt from the beaches of Peschiera del Garda. Is it true?