just wondering what the regulations are for night fishing on a boat. i know you have to have lights for the boat but im just wondering if you can acually shine a light to see where you are going. isn’t it illegal to spot fish with your lights? or is it just illegal to attract fish? cause im thinking about bringing one of them 1,000,000 candle power lights on board just to see where we’re going and ofcourse for lighting…. thanks -mo
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m just wondering if you can acually shine a light to see where you are going.
Us cat guys use them all the time for navigation and to see what’s going bump in the night.
Navagation and attracting fish are two different things and not very hard for a CO to figure out what your up to.
By the way, Brian. Where were you when the lights went OUT ?
WKW
A million candle power is a terrific light in the yard and around the house. You are going to be shocked at how a night on the river is going to eat up all that light. Things with reflectors on them such as bouys will show up, but you will get uncomfortably close to dark objects before you detect them. If you are in unfamiliar surroundings, take it easy.
I suppose maybe it is different if you are on a river, but generally on lakes people don’t use something akin to headlights on a car as they run. Spotlights are generally only used looking for something specific like bouys or rocks or maybe to help with landing a fish. Generally speaking I don’t think people like being flashed by a spotlight, I know I don’t.
One tip, on a calm night on a clear lake it’s amazing what you can see by shining a spotlight down in the water close to the boat. To my knowledge shining of fish is not illegal cause the light is above the water. Personally I’ve never tried to catch a fish while it is being shined. I recommend looking around with the light to see what you can learn about an area and then go to fishing with the light off.
Good post…sometimes I forget there are lakes in MN! 
Right on about blinding people with lights! I never flash a boat on purpose and am careful to watch the reflection of the light into the water as that can reflect and blind them too.
We see many minnows and Gar around our boat in the darkness. Fun to watch!
gps helps in the dark
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