fishing

Pluralfishings (some meanings)

1. 1
   noununcountable

   The act of catching fish, whether from rivers, lakes, or the sea, for food or sport.

   Early-morning fishing gave the village most of its daily food.

   Good fishing depends on the season, the weather, and a bit of luck.

   Similarangling

   Note

   A plain compound of fish and -ing, already fischynge in Middle English. As a mass noun it is measured in time rather than counted: a good day's fishing, an afternoon's fishing. It also sits in front of other nouns, as in fishing rights. In Michael Arlen's Piracy (1922) a character acquires a mile of them with his house. The countable plural belongs to the place where fish are caught.

2. 2
   verb

   Present participle of fish.

   She is fishing for trout in the mountain stream.

   We are fishing near the harbor until the tide turns.

   Note

   The verb form carries every sense of fish, not just the angler's. Someone fishing in a drawer is searching among objects. Someone fishing for an answer is coaxing people to give it. A batsman fishing outside off stump reaches for a ball and misses. As a gerund it overlaps with the noun for catching fish. The test is grammar: only the verb takes an object, as in fishing the river.

3. 3
   noununcountable

   The business or industry of catching fish and other seafood for sale.

   Fishing remains the main industry in many of the older harbor villages.

   Government subsidies kept the nation's fishing afloat during the downturn.

   Similarfishery

4. 4
   nouncolloquialuncountable

   The act of catching other kinds of seafood, on its own or together with fish.

   Summer fishing here brings in baskets of mussels and crab.

   Good fishing off these rocks means a haul of shrimp by sundown.

5. 5
   nouncountable

   A place for catching fish; a fishery along a river, lake, or coast.

   The estate included a productive fishing along two miles of the bank.

   He leased one of the best salmon fishings in the county for the season.

   Similarfishery

   Note

   Here the word becomes countable and takes a plural, fishings. It names a stretch of water held as property, something rented, leased and valued. Spenser writes of "the rent of the fishings" in 1596, and The Scots Law Times of 1917 still lists salmon-fishings in the Valuation Rolls. Expect it in deeds, estates and legal writing. When it means the activity, the word never takes a plural.

Showing meanings only. Show all 5