# Needle Fish



## Lipyourown

are they any good as live bait....the 14" ones for stripers?


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## sand flea

I've never seen a striper attack one. Besides, I wouldn't want to use one as bait--how would you ever get that godawful smell off your hands?


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## Lipyourown

Gotcha, where I fish the beach near PLO there are tons of them in the feeder creeks and they follow your spoon and hit it but can never hook em. cool looking animal though

I thought that smell was me....

thanks anyway


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## sand flea

Trust me, if you ever land one you will know what I'm talking about. They stink to high heaven. If you really want to catch one, just put on a Mirrolure or rattle trap and pull it slowly past them. Just look out for the teeth when you go to unhook them.


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## Armyguy

I found an article about needlefish:

"Needlefish have two long jaws, good for catching fish. A needlefish strikes at passing prey with a sideways movement of the head, then swallows it whole.

Like their other close relatives, the flyingfish (malolo), needlefish can leap from the water at up to 38 miles an hour, skimming the surface before falling back to the water. This is where needlefish and people can clash.

At night, lights sometimes attract and excite these fish, causing them to jump at speed. Needlefish beaks have penetrated the wooden hulls of outrigger canoes.

Tragically, one also penetrated the eye of a 10-year-old Kauai boy while he was night fishing in a small boat with his father. The fish beak penetrated the boy's brain, killing him.

In other parts of the Pacific, needlefish have punctured people in the chest, abdomen, arms, legs, head and neck.

People at greatest risk of needlefish punctures are night reef fishermen carrying lights in low boats. For many village fishermen in the Pacific, needlefish are a greater occupational hazard than sharks.

Although it's rare, swimmers and divers have been seriously injured by needlefish in Japan, New Zealand and the Red Sea."

full article available at http://www.aloha.com/~lifeguards/needle.html


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## punkineeeter

wow..i didn't know they had the potential to be so dangerous...i googled "needlefish" and got some scarey pics  

needlefish 1 

needlefish 2 

needlefish 3 

..uhh...i definitely don't ever want to see one of these in the water...or flying towards my eyeballs


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## MANDINGO

*My What Big Teeth*

WOULDNT WANT THAT THING NEAR ME OR MY EYES OR FINGERS LOOK AT THOSE TEETH. OUCH!!!!


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## Lipyourown

Sand Flea was right, they really stink bad...got another one accidentally this past weekend and chucked it back.

Sat. day north of PLO we took out an 11'5" aluminum boat - Grumman w/7.5 J and harassed the dink schools for about 30 of em (all under 18"). Off the beach Sat night my buddy nailed a 10 pounder on cut LY! Lucky sob. 

Sunday nothing off the beach in the AM (excepted snagged LYs) then we took out small boat again. Anyone on the causeway? That was us trolling about a 1/2 mile out. Nothing. Found the dinks again and caught maybe 10.


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## ly02

Just to clarify, this is Lip at home: I've caught bunches of the toothy critters in my castnet, only bumps on the lures. Anyway, they waste the nets with teeth but they are much smaller than those in the pics above where I see them in the creeks.


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