Where can I buy leeches?

[Obabikon]

Originally Posted by walleyecheek

Nestor falls bait & tackle is still getting leeches (not many) selling them in a 4 dozen container ( not by the pound) 29.95 Canadian !

$30 for 4 dozen leeches? WOW...

[walleyecheek]

WOW !!! Is right

[Pooch]

Originally Posted by Obabikon

$30 for 4 dozen leeches? WOW...

Makes crawlers look pretty darned good!!! Plastics even more so.

The thing that grates on me is driving through Wisconsin and Minnesota and passing bait shop after bait shop with leeches available for about half of what we pay in Ontario. I DO NOT mind paying more for bait north of the border, but when there is none available and it is available south of the border..............

The leech ban went into effect when the USDA stopped imports of beef from Canada during the "mad Cow" outbreak ten or fifteen years ago. Pretty typical of cross border trade tiffs.

If there is no biological reason to ban cross border leech imports then let the folks from USA bring leeches over, but pay a duty on them.

In reality, it is of little consequence whether I fish with leeches or worms. Both catch fish, but I just like fishing leeches for some reason. Might be the same genetic defect that makes me a cranky old duffer.

Pooch

[38bill]

We were fishing in Canada the last full week of July. Leeches were already very hard to find then but our host buys direct from the bait collector and he had a few left that were saved for us. I also stopped at Mills Fleet Farm on the way up and purchased crawlers just to make sure we had bait. I prefer fishing with leeches as they are cleaner but we tried the crawlers to see what would happen and they seemed to work just as well. They sure are messy though.