Oops, sorry forgot to mention : For tying two lines together, overhand knot, half hitch the ends. Great favorite in the climbing community. Not elegant but very effective.

Since fishing requires being passively active (or actively passive) I’d like to know how to make a gillnet with, say, dental floss. This would allow time for tender gathering or other active survival chores.

Pat

Doug

I've never liked the improved cinch (don't know why it's the knot featured on just about every pack of fishhooks sold). It's a damn difficult knot to tie with monofiliment in the best of circumstances.

Palomar is good.

I actually find a snell (sp?) pretty easy to tie. Don't know if it's a real snell or just looks like a snell, but it's very similar to the improved cinch except instead of wrapping around the floppy mono, you wrap around the shank of the hook. Pass 4 or 5 inches through the eye. Make a loop and pass 1 inch through eye again, same direction. Pinch free end against shank with index finger and thumb, grab loop with other hand and wrap 5 or 6 wraps around shank and end of line. Carefully pull free end while holding wraps snug and everything tightens up around the shank like a hangmans noose. I'd once found a very clear illustration of this on net. I'll look and see if I can find it again.

Ratcliffs discription is a good easy way to join two lines. Don't know how good for dissimilar lines though.

Actually, I've come to the conclusion that the point of fishing in a typical short term survival circumstance isn't to catch fish, it's to entertain yourself and keep you out of trouble. If you do happen to catch something, great, but it's a luxury. YMMV...

So, that sort of flies in the face of your goal, unless the making of the gill net is the choice for keeping yourself busy. <g> BTW, they take a good deal of time and effort if you've never done one before, so not something you would do to allow time for some more critical survival chore.

For gill net making instructions, just check out the fishing section of many military survival manuals, for example:

http://www.equipped.org/fm21-76.htm
http://www.equipped.org/fm3-0570.htm

A good project for long winter nights if you've got nothing better to do with your time, perhaps, but from a practical perspective, if you really want a gill net as part of your survival kit, they are not very expensive, weigh little and vacuum pack down very small. I've carried one for many years in my personal aircraft kit, though it'll be left out on my next repack as unnecessary.

What about a "field test" of sorts? Next time you give a talk to a group of people, or are at a gun show, have the instructions available with some mono and ask people to tie the knots following the instructions. It would be a good way to see how idiot proof the knots are with the intended mediium for tying. Take some notes on the results to help you with your decision. Of course asking for novices would provide more conclusive results.

.02

I just go to local malls and ask people to try stuff. Seems to work. At presentations, which are infrequent in any case, there's never enough time to cover what I want to cover, let alone do something like that. <~>

Doug,

One of the easiest knots to tie that retains almost 100% of running line strength is the uni knot.

The knot can be used to tie hooks, swivels, even lines together.

The uni knot can be used to tie any weight of line from 6lb up to 100lb leader materail.

It would simplify your instruction sheet.

Just my 2 cents.

I've used the Uni for braided line and high tech aramid, never tired it for Mono. will check it out.

I absolutely second that!

I've used the Uni-knot with mono, braided line, all kinds of terminal tackle. I also join my backing mono to the superbraided lines such as Fireline or Spiderwire.

I still have a tendency to use the Palomar with braided because they say it's the only knot that won't slip, but the newer Fireline has superior knot strength and I would feel fine going with the Uni-knot.

Uni-knot! <img src="/images/graemlins/cool.gif" alt="" />

I'm not sure I completley agree with Doug, but dont' try to make a gill net out of dental floss. That's waxed, it will stick together. You might be better off with a soda bottle fish trap.