unfishable

1 7.2

Too polluted or shallow to catch fish

adjective
/ʌnˈfɪʃəbl/

: inpesca

The strong current and debris made the river unfishable during the stormy season.

Examples

After the chemical spill, the once-popular fishing spot was declared unfishable by environmental officials.
Forty miles later, having arrived at the river I had inexplicably chosen, I saw the situation exactly as I had foreseen: the river was over its banks and unfishable.

Fiction book (1991)
Due to heavy rain and runoff, the lake became unfishable for weeks, discouraging local anglers.

Synonyms

fishless

vsunfishable

1 2.4

Having no fish present or caught

is unsuitable or impossible to use for catching fish because of pollution

Antonyms

fishable

1 4.1

A body of water where people can catch fish

How Fishable

teeming

12 4.7

fishable

1 4.1

unfishable

1 7.2

Surface Forms

unfishable positive

Morphology

unfishable = fishable (transparent) = un + fish + able

The meaning is clearly derived from 'fishable' with the addition of the prefix 'un-' indicating negation.

Etymology

The word unfishable breaks into un- 'not', fish, and -able 'able to'. So it simply means 'not able to be fished', for example when the water is too dirty or too low for fishing.