Barrie Rickards’ Angling

Professor Barrie Rickards is President of the Lure Angling Society, and President of the National Association of Specialist Anglers as well as a very experienced and successful specialist angler with a considerable tally of big fish to his credit.

He is author of several fishing books, including the classic work ‘Fishing For Big Pike’, co-authored with the late Ray Webb and only recently his first novel, ‘Fishers On The Green Roads’ was published. He has been an angling writer in newspapers and magazines for nigh on four decades. Barrie takes a keen interest in angling politics.

Away from angling Barrie is a reader in Palaeobiology at the University of Cambridge, a Fellow of Emmanuel College and a curator of the Sedgwick Museum of Geology.

One of the issues they are involved with is potential legislation on non-native species (a review of non-native species policies has just ended its consultation period). I seem to have read a great deal on this subject and many issues are unclear to me, not least being what is meant by non-native species? Do they mean zander, for example, or catfish? Or do they mean species that are not native for a particular water? Or perhaps it relates only to moving livebaits about! If they mean species that are not native to a particular water then I do hope they will take action of some kind against the Scottish equivalent of English Nature who planned the introduction of a whitefish species into two lochs that did not have them previously.

Are the authorities planning a halt to any movement of fish? This would leave the ecosystems as they are at present, and certainly there’s enough biodiversity nationwide to keep us all happy. Or do they plan eradication of, say, ruffe from Loch Lomond (and who is sure they were not there in the first place, because Lomond is very close to the previously-known northern limit of the species). And what is to happen about carp and catfish coming in from the Continent? Some people are now working very hard in this regard and they deserve more support that they are getting.

And then we come to nature itself. Are waterhens to be prosecuted if they transfer eggs from one water to another? Incidentally, its probably a fallacy that birds transfer eggs which have stuck to their feet. After all, in order for them to stick to their feet the birds must have had their feet in the very areas where eggs were being deposited and fertilised. It wouldn’t be enough to come along ten minutes later because by then the glue on the eggs would have hardened onto the substrate. It’s possible, but unlikely. What is much more likely is something I once watched at Woburn wildlife park – waterhens carrying beakfuls of green weed from one water to another! That weed could have easily had eggs on it. And the waterhens were not interested in eating fish eggs, only in building nests. When they do so they sometimes use green weed at water level, topping it off later with dry material.

To be quite serious: nature itself will move species about as it always has done. Eradication of transfers would be nonsensical – attempted eradication I should say. They’ve tried that in western Ireland and it is a total waste of time and money. Usually, of course, they waste someone else’s money, like yours and mine.

The Labour and Conservative Parties
Let’s go more political still, and talk about the Labour and Conservative parties. Last time I did this I got clobbered by the Labour peer Lord Mason (a pro-angling man to be sure) and was refused a right of reply by the editor of the journal. So I’ll make my position fairly clear: I have voted in the past for both parties, but cannot see myself voting for either of them again. That is, I’m not a rabid Conservative at all. No, Lord Mason had that wrong, and my roots, if not my heart, are socialist. Why am I telling you this? Well, because Labour is once again going through the motions of writing an angler’s charter. Why? Do we need one? Are not Labour protesting too much, trying to convince us that there are lots of Labour pro-angling MPs out there? Or in the Lords?

The Conservatives (dreadful bunch) have never wittered on about a charter because they see no problem with angling. Angling is. Full stop. But Labour includes plenty of people who are opposed to angling, make no mistake about that. They are not all Martin Salters by any means. Over many years of dealing with politicians of all persuasions I have to say that most of angling’s problems locally come from Labour people. Let me give you an example.

When the Mayor of Redditch (Ken Smith, a Labour angler) was trying to set up a National Angling Museum on Council land in Redditch, Bruno Broughton, Martin Gay, and myself were asked to address the Council on the merits of the idea. There was, by the end of the evening, widespread support for the plan, but, and this is my point, the only opposition came from some Labour councillors. In time some of them changed their minds, but some of them did not. The plan did not materialise for other reasons as it happened.

Another Council, Liberal this time, were not actually opposed to the idea of an angling museum: They simply gave the site to a supermarket chain instead! No, I am very, very wary of Labour politicians talking about angling. And I am quite certain we do not need a charter from them. The previous charter labour produced was terrible! I am aware that some experienced anglers such as David Bird had an input in it, but I cannot believe that the bulk of the text was by them. If it was, then I’d have to revise a few opinions!

Still battling away!
Still on politics. I see Des Taylor has recently said that he’d never get involved in angling politics again. I have sympathy with this viewpoint, especially from some one who did his stint, and did it well. I do think that if I got out of angling politics I’d never have the strength to go back in, and that’s a fact. I once said that I’d give up for certain at the age of 55 but here I am ten years on, still battling away.

Perhaps I should give up I hear you say! Maybe so, in fact, after 25 years representing anglers on the Environment Agency (or its predecessors) I finally resigned for a bit of peace. So what happened? I was asked to chair the EA investigation into water resources in NW Norfolk! So that’s what I’m doing primarily, apart from SAA work, and PAC work, and a few other things……

I first joined an angling committee in 1954, as a secretary. So next year I’ll have done 50 years continuously on one committee or another, local or national. Maybe next year is the time to stop, or the time to stop taking on new work. Just been to see ‘Finding Nemo’! It’s a really enjoyable film. Less enjoyable is the thought that thousands of Americans are flushing fish down the loo. I have only just set myself up with a cold water tank with gudgeon, rudd, roach and tench (so far). A Disney spokesperson said they disapproved of keeping clown fish (Nemo) in tanks. Well, if the fish is small and the tank is large, what’s the problem? Disney films are grossly sentimentalised, of course, but I thought everyone understood that. They’re not supposed to be taken seriously, though it seems PETA has done so.

Unimpressed by Anti anglers the McCartneys and Loony Bardot
Talking of PETA, I see that Paul McCartney’s wife is to become the PETA pin-up. The McCartney’s have long been anti-angling it seems, and I have to say that not only have I been singularly unimpressed by their blurbs on animal welfare, but it is also a great relief to me that I never really took to Beatles music! Anyway, angling bodies need to add them to their list of antis which would include, naturally, that lunatic Bridget Bardot. Well, you might not agree with me on that one but I tend to judge people by their utterances on angling or related countryside matters.

So now we have herpes in Kois! But, have you noticed, it is always commercial enterprises from which diseases appear? Never nature – or rarely, and certainly not anglers transporting bait whatever the powers that be have to say.

Shakespeare’s Targa monofil
Forgive me for mentioning something with which I am associated, namely Shakespeare’s Targa monofil. I tested it intensively at one stage, and still use it regularly (like nearly every trip!). It has had good reviews recently despite its dozy name, and despite having variations in diameter. Actually, as with many lines, I find it breaks above its stated strength (cautious manufacturers I guess, allowing for minute diameter variations.) One test that is often mentioned by reviewers/testers is abrasion resistance. I do my own tests, under a microscope, and I have to say that there seems to me to be little difference between different named brands. But monofil does part less easily on rocks than braid, so that is an important factor sometimes.

Have you seen the adverts for the rather nice Herring plates (eg the Narrow boat)? It said “It’s spring…the river is coming to life…” And it has anglers coarse fishing. In spring? I wish. Maybe they did in the dawn of the horse-drawn narrow boat. Before my time… really. Might buy one. They’re nice. Maybe two.

The Sore with a Bare head
On FISHINGmagic.com I once reviewed a new edition of a classic of angling thinking, ‘Fishing and Thinking’ by Professor A.A. Luce (an appropriate name for an angler) of Dublin. It is a fine book on the philosophy of angling but is seriously flawed in one quarter on an issue of his ignorance of coarse fishing, he being primarily a trout angler. There’s no good reason for such flawed thinking just because you happen to be a game angler: for example, Lawrence Coultow did not fall into the same trap when he the superb ‘Confessions of a Shooting Fishing Man’. However, an interesting story has come my way concerning A.A. Luce, who was Professor of Moral Philosophy in Trinity College, Dublin (where I, too, was once a lecturer). Apparently he was rather a tetchy individual and follically challenged to boot. Many of us cannot complain about the latter, of course, but the combination of the two attributes led him to be known in TCD as ‘the sore with a bare head’. This information, and the postcard on which I received this information, is now tucked in the fly leaf of his book!

SETA and Water Trading
I have just been reading some stuff by Louise Byrne, who does a good job for the SETA, her record press release on ‘Water Trading’ may not be quite so spot on, however, so I thought I’d add a word or two. The Environment Agency is reviewing abstraction licenses for the whole nation, initially on a regional basis. Water trading is a suggestion whereby unused licence capacity in one site may be traded onto another. There’s a little bit more to it than that but primarily it is to give greater flexibility to current abstraction usage. This is only part of a complicated review process which will look at all aspects of water usage/abstraction in the UK. Where I seem to part company from Louise’s recent email circular which represents the views of Paul knight is where she writes “This agreement takes no account of the impact on aquatic ecosystems.”

I know this has to be wrong because I am the chairman of just such an EA investigation into water resources/abstraction in NW Norfolk, and it has to be said that the structure of aquatic ecosystems is to forefront of all discussions/plans. Not only that, but the stakeholder groups include English Nature, the SETA, (and anglers generally, through Terry Mansbridge) and others with the ecosystem at heart. She refers, correctly to a ‘tangled web’ in relation to abstraction: it is exactly for this reason that the reviews are taking place. In the end each review will recommend to the EA a package of proposals which, in their views will protect the environment whilst at the same time go as far as is reasonable in safeguarding the interests of various stakeholders (which includes you and I through to the water companies, for example). So, the review teams (CAMS) make recommendations and the EA, it’s anticipated, will be more or less obliged to carry them through. There are no obvious political overtones in this work: in the end it will save money, yes, and waste. And it is crucial that all stakeholders, such as SETA, have a serious input in order to safeguard their own worries.