Well, compared to using a fishing magnet in the United States, magnet fishing in the UK would be a little more difficult.

Tracing back to the source, what makes magnet fishing so tricky is due to the restrictive General Canal Bylaws of 1965, which was launched and promoted by the former British Waterways, a non-profitable organization, and then renamed in 2012 as the Canal & River Trust.

According to this organization (Canal & River Trust) statement, they “do not allow magnet fishing because it could be extremely dangerous.” That is why they do not let it happen in some general public areas or waterways that they control.

Although the General Canal Byelaws of 1965 does not mention magnet fishing specifically, they do talk about the dredging of canals, rivers, as well as waterways, and here comes the full regulation, “No person unless authorized by the Board in that behalf or otherwise legally entitled so to do shall: (d) Dredge or remove coal or other material from any canal.”

Here comes a snippet from the referenced Canal & River Trust:

Since magnet fishing, well, to some extent, is also a method of dredging, most activities like this type could be challenging to do in the United Kingdom.

Nowadays, the only situation that magnet fishing is allowed in the United Kingdom is; you are doing it on your private property; alternatively, you have already acquired authorization from the Canal & River Trust to use the fishing magnet.

In order to dredge your rivers and lakes, you must apply for the right to do that.

As a matter of fact, authorization is not always so easy to acquire; however, most individuals who own private property should not have too much difficulty in obtaining access.

If you happened to own no land and were not allowed to use a fishing magnet or were unable to acquire permission, let me offer you another solution. You could use the fishing magnet on the private property of someone else with authorization.

First of all, all you need to do is get permission from that person, and it would be perfect if you set up a written agreement about how you and your partner share the item you find. I suggest that you split the value of the items in a relatively fair and reasonable method. Let me give you a for instance; you could offer them 50% of the value of the goods, and then you keep the rest of it.

I have to admit that this high level probably seems unfair to you; however, the person who owns the land on which you dredged need also should receive some compensation for offering you permission.

It also might happen if some persons might ask you to offer much higher rates for using their property, which could be very depressing if you can not find anywhere else to do the magnet fishing.

Anyway, it’s always suggested that you should own a kit of magnet fishing if you are interested in doing that, and that, of course, will not cost you too much, and then be sure to cooperate with someone who you genuinely trust just to avoid any unexpected and unpleasant dispute.