These fishing quotes will inspire you. Fishing is the activity of trying to catch fish. Fish are often caught in the wild but may also be caught from stocked bodies of water.
Below you will find a collection of motivating, happy, and encouraging fishing quotes, fishing sayings, and fishing proverbs.
Inspirational Fishing Quotes
- “When you fish for love, bait with your heart, not your brain.” ~ Mark Twain
- “Many men go fishing all of their lives without knowing that it is not fish they are after.” ~ Henry David Thoreau
- “Give a man a fish and you feed him for a day; teach a man to fish and you feed him for a lifetime.” ~ Maimonides
- “If people don’t occasionally walk away from you shaking their heads, you’re doing something wrong.” ~ John Gierach
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“A fishing rod is a stick with a hook at one end and a fool at the other.” ~ Samuel Johnson
- “If I fished only to capture fish, my fishing trips would have ended long ago.” ~ Zane Grey
- “The charm of fishing is that it is the pursuit of what is elusive but attainable, a perpetual series of occasions for hope.” ~ John Buchan
- “The two best times to fish is when it’s raining and when it ain’t.” ~ Patrick F. McManus
- “Whether I caught fish or not, just the thrill of rolling out that line and watching my fly turn over has been good enough for me. That and the hundreds of treasured memories I have of this wonderful sport.” ~ Curt Gowdy
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“There’s a fine line between fishing and just standing on the shore like an idiot.” ~ Steven Wright
- “I’ve gone fishing thousands of times in my life, and I have never once felt unlucky or poorly paid for those hours on the water.” ~ William G. Tapply , Fishing quotes about life
- “Something to think about: If you fish the wrong fly long and hard enough, it will sooner or later become the right fly.” ~ John Gierach
- “The solution to any problem -work, love, money, whatever -is to go fishing, and the worse the problem, the longer the trip should be.” ~ John Gierach
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“The sea, once it casts its spell, holds one in its net of wonder forever.” ~ Jacques Yves Cousteau
- “I think I fish, in part, because it’s an anti-social, bohemian business that, when gone about properly, puts you forever outside the mainstream culture without actually landing you in an institution.” ~ John Gierach
- “Fishing is much more than fish. It is the great occasion when we may return to the fine simplicity of our forefathers.” ~ Herbert Hoover
- “I have fished through fishless days that I remember happily without regret.” ~ Roderick Haig-Brown
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“Best fishing in troubled waters.” ~ John Harington
- “The man who goes fishing gets something more than the fish he catches.” ~ Mary Astor
- “The fishing was good; it was the catching that was bad.” ~ A. Best
- “Give a man a fish and he will eat for a day. Teach him how to fish, and he will sit in a boat and drink beer all day.” ~ George Carlin
- “The best fisherman I know try not to make the same mistakes over and over again; instead they strive to make new and interesting mistakes and to remember what they learned from them.” ~ John Gierach
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“The biggest fish he ever caught were those that got away.” ~ Eugene Field
- “They say you forget your troubles on a trout stream, but that’s not quite it. What happens is that you begin to see where your troubles fit into the grand scheme of things, and suddenly they’re just not such a big deal anymore.” ~ John Gierach
- “Many of the most highly publicized events of my presidency are not nearly as memorable or significant in my life as fishing with my daddy.” ~ Jimmy Carter , Fishing quotes for dad
- “Eventually, all things merge into one, and a river runs through it.” ~ Norman Maclean
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“If people concentrated on the really important things in life, there’d be a shortage of fishing poles.” ~ Doug Larson
- “Don’t tell fish stories where the people know you; but particularly, don’t tell them where they know the fish.” ~ Mark Twain
- “Most fishermen swiftly learn that it’s a pretty good rule never to show a favorite spot to any fisherman you wouldn’t trust with your wife.” ~ John D. Voelker
- “No man ever steps in the same river twice, for it’s not the same river and he’s not the same man.” ~ Heraclitus
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“Fish die belly upward and rise to the surface. It’s their way of falling.” ~ Andre Gide
- “Of course, now I am too old to be much of a fisherman, and now of course I usually fish the big waters alone, although some friends think I shouldn’t. Like many fly fishermen in western Montana where the summer days are almost Arctic in length, I often do not start fishing until the cool of the evening. Then in the Arctic half-light of the canyon, all existence fades to a being with my soul and memories and the sounds of the Big Blackfoot River and a four-count rhythm and the hope that a fish will rise.” ~ Norman Maclean
- “I do fish. I think there is a connection between thinking and fishing mostly because you spend a lot of time up to your waist in water without a whole lot to keep your mind busy.” ~ Anthony Doerr
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“Most of the world is covered by water. A fisherman’s job is simple: Pick out the best parts.” ~ Charles W. Waterman
- “He told us about Christ’s disciples being fisherman, and we were left to assume…that all great fishermen on the Sea of Galilee were fly fisherman and that John, the favorite, was a dry-fly fisherman.” ~ Norman Maclean
- “Last year I went fishing with Salvador Dali. He was using a dotted line. He caught every other fish.” ~ Steven Wright
- “There will be days when the fishing is better than one’s most optimistic forecast, others when it is far worse. Either is a gain over just staying home.” ~ Roderick Haig-Brown
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“There is no greater fan of fly fishing than the worm.” ~ Patrick F. McManus
- “Today she met me at the door, said I would have to choose, if I picked up that fishing rod today, she’d be packing all her things and she’d be gone by noon….well I’m gonna miss her when I get home tonight.” ~ Brad Paisley
- “Often I have been exhausted on trout streams, uncomfortable, wet, cold, briar scarred, sunburned, mosquito-bitten, but never, with a fly rod in my hand have I been less than in a place that was less than beautiful.” ~ Charles Kuralt
- “In every species of fish I’ve angled for, it is the ones that have got away that thrill me the most, the ones that keep fresh in my memory. So I say it is good to lose fish. If we didn’t, much of the thrill of angling would be gone.” ~ Ray Bergman
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“Smoked carp tastes just as good as smoked salmon when you ain’t got no smoked salmon.” ~ Patrick F. McManus
- “I used to like fishing because I thought it had some larger significance. Now I like fishing because it’s the one thing I can think of that probably doesn’t.” ~ John Gierach
- “Hunting, fishing, drawing, and music occupied my every moment. Cares I knew not, and cared naught about them.” ~ John James Audubon
- “I’m fishing for men with a certain kind of bait, and the bait that I am offering is not a candy; it’s a very specific thing that I’m offering, which is a deep gospel and a deep conversion.” ~ Larry Norman
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“We are standing on a whale fishing for minnows.” ~ Joseph Campbell
- “And one thing I can be proud of is we have a ‘Come and Try Fishing’ day every year. And there’s 20 venues throughout the state, and see, these thousands of kids who’ve never been fishing come along.” ~ Rex Hunt
- “We have seen Indians in immense numbers, and all those on this coast of the Pacific contrive to make a good subsistence on various seeds, and by fishing.” ~ Junipero Serra
- “All those authors there, most of whom of course I’ve never met. That’s the poetry side, that’s the prose side, that’s the fishing and miscellaneous behind me. You get an affection for books that you’ve enjoyed.” ~ Norman MacCaig
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“Fly-fishing is the most fun you can have standing up.” ~ Arnold Gingrich
- “Time is but the stream I go a-fishing in. I drink at it; but while I drink I see the sandy bottom and detect how shallow it is. Its thin current slides away, but eternity remains.” ~ Henry David Thoreau
- “Monofilament is what you use to go fishing. The line on your fishing rod is probably going to be black. You get to the end of the line and you tie on this clear plastic, thin thread called monofilament.” ~ John Badham
- “I fish because I love to . . . because I love the environs where trout are found . . . because I suspect that men are going along this way for the last time, and I for one don’t want to waste the trip . . . and, finally, not because I regard fishing as being so terribly important but because I suspect that so many of the other concerns of men are equally unimportant––and not nearly so much fun.” ~ John D. Voelker
- “The angling fever is a very real disease and can only be cured by the application of cold water and fresh, untainted air.” ~ Theodore Gordon
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“Fishing is a… discipline in the equality of men – for all men are equal before fish.” ~ Herbert Hoover
- “Angling is extremely time-consuming. That’s sort of the whole point.” ~ Thomas McGuane
- “It is to be observed that ‘angling’ is the name given to fishing by people who can’t fish.” ~ Stephen Leacock
- “You know when they have a fishing show on TV? They catch the fish and then let it go. They don’t want to eat the fish, they just want to make it late for something.” ~ Mitch Hedberg
- “If you ever wondered why fishing is probably the most popular sport in this country, watch that boy beside on the water and you will learn. If you are really perceptive you will. For he already knows that fishing is only one part fish.” ~ Hal Borland
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“If fishing is a religion, fly fishing is the high church.” ~ Tom Brokaw
- “Fishing is boring unless you catch an actual fish, and then it is disgusting.” ~ Dave Barry
- “The gods do not deduct from man’s allotted span the hours spent in fishing.” ~ Herbert Hoover
- “There is certainly something in angling that tends to produce a serenity of the mind.” ~ Washington Irving
- “Fishing is the chance to wash one’s soul with pure air. It brings meekness and inspiration, reduces our egoism, soothes our troubles, and shames our wickedness. It is a discipline in the equality of men–for all men are equal before fish.” ~ Herbert Hoover
- “Next to prayer, fishing is the most personal relationship of man.” ~ Herbert Hoover
