Our outdoors superstitions

Superstition has long been affiliated with human survival. Ancient cultures held festivals with animal sacrifices to appease fickle deities and ensure bountiful harvests. Thousands of years later, we still say gesundheit, or bless you, after hearing a sneeze, originally intended to prevent illness by keeping the soul from leaving the body. In this age of information where there’s over a millennium of human knowledge digitized at your fingertips, we’re curious to see what superstitions our contributors observe while in the field and on the water.

OOD superstitions

“I am told that brook trout only eat every second day. That makes it easy to justify a return trip Sunday if you get skunked on Saturday. It also feeds the ‘you should have been here yesterday’ narrative.

One I subscribe to is that it’s bad luck when river fishing to catch a fish on the first cast into a pool. Any time I have caught a fish on the first try, it ends up being the only fish I’ll get out of that spot. So, sometimes I’ll intentionally botch the first drift. I suspect it relates to fish knowing it is the only one in the pool, and it doesn’t feel any need to feed cautiously.

I’m sure someone else by now has mentioned that a banana on a boat is supposed to be bad luck, as is spitting in the water.” — Geoff Coleman

“Forgetting my trolling motor remote feels like a curse. No Spot Lock means the wind takes over, the fish disappear, and my patience vanishes with them. I swear the remote holds some kind of magic — leave it behind, and the lake turns completely against me.” — Lisa Hughes

“There’s the banana thing. I personally never knew about it until my wife brought bananas on Jimmy Riggin’ Fishing Charters out of Long Point and heard about it from Captain Jimmy himself. We weren’t catching before he knew about the bananas and then started to after he insisted we throw them overboard.

I like to take clothes with moose on them when going moose hunting. My moose pyjamas have paid off while hunting in Newfoundland. I had my Newfoundland Moose Whisperer shirt on while scouting this year and saw the first moose I have seen in Ontario in years.” — Jeff Helsdon

“I’m not overly superstitious, but NO BANANAS in my boat, and I like to give my Canadian bass keychain a rub for good luck on tournament mornings. It was made (beaded) by a friend that I grew up with in Kenora, Terry Parisien.” — Jeff Gustafson

“If anything, I eat bananas out in the boat, so I guess I’m anti-superstitious, haha!” — Justin Hoffman

"I love hunting upland game birds with my dogs. I call Neva my George Springer dog — she’s a star, but like George, has been injured some. If George gets hurt again, I dread what might happen to Neva. I’m more than a bit nervous, with small game season and the playoffs approaching." — Bruce Ranta

“Someone once taught me to spit in a fish’s mouth and say ‘bring back your big brother’ before throwing it back. Didn’t love it; didn’t keep that one going.” — Anonymous

From oodmag.com/community

“Bananas in the boat was a bad omen, because spiders of all sorts could be found hiding in there and some were venomous.” — Fisherman

“I thought they were bad luck because back in the day the locals would overload their boats taking them to market and all that would be found when they sank/capsized was bananas floating everywhere.

You will never get a walleye trolling in Quinte until you pee over the side of the boat.” — johnjyb

“You’ll see nothing all day but the moment you open your fly, drop your shorts, or open your bagged lunch the game will abound.” — finsfurfeathers

Originally published in the Fall 2025 issue of Ontario Out Of Doors

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