No Excuse For 'The One That Got Away'

When I first read the article I thought how good this is for us all. Then I thought more carefully. Many of the big fish we specialist anglers catch are from quiet stretches with very low stock densities. If there are more fish then the ultimate biggest may well be smaller. Also these stretches of river will no longer be quiet with the possible massive influx of match and pleasure anglers. So, from a purely selfish point of view, I do not think this is such good news. There are plenty of carp puddles for people who prefer to catch a lot of fish rather than a few specimens.

Dave, most of the big fish stretches I fish also have low stocks but the problem is that few, if any, younger generations of fish are coming through (due to cormorant predation, etc). Which is great for us right now but very bad news for future generations of anglers.

I take your point Graham. This season there seemed to be a lot of small fish around on the rivers I fish, even on the quiet stretches that I usually fish. It must vary in different regions if they are absent on your rivers. The thing that really worries me is increasing commercialism. In the past I have been asked which branch of coarse fishing I do, carp or match. When I say neither there is a look of total bewilderment. I used to do a lot of carp fishing before it became commercial but it does not appeal now. Unfortunately barbel fishing is now going the way of carp fishing. I like barbel and I used to fish for them quite a lot in the past. I was even a member of the barbel catchers for a while. There is no way I will fish for them now they have become so popular though. I don't like crowds when I am fishing. These days I deliberately look for stretches of river with no barbel in them. I was horrified when half a dozen or so clones arrived on one of my quiet stretches a few years ago. They all had regulation barbel police clothes and big buckets. "We're from the barbel society" one of them said. "So f***ing what" thought I. I am pretty sure there are no barbel on this stretch but there are some very good chub. After they had had a couple of days on the stretch with their big buckets all of the swims were well worn. There is usually no sign of anybody fishing on this stretch. The chub also became almost impossible to catch for a few weeks. Why anybody would want to fish in a large group other than when match fishing or on an organised get together is beyond me. We all have our own preferences when fishing but peace and quiet does it for me every time. This is why I was worried to read about increased fish populations.

I understand where you're coming from Dave and what you say makes sense. There's nothing like having a river stretch to yourself and being able to wander about from swim to swim. Or just settling in one swim when time is short. Watercraft on a river takes on a new dimension compared to stillwaters. In one way it's easier for there is much more character to study, but harder if you don't know what to look for.

Dave, what did you do ten /fifteen years ago when there were no where near as many commercial waters and more anglers? The rivers must have been far busier than they are now. Can’t remember which article it was but in, but one article talked about two trains every weekend travelling down from Sheffield to the Trent in the 60’s/70’s and 1000 peg matches! I take it Dave this wasn’t your scene?
The thing that worries me about quiet river stretches is that they are very expensive because of syndication or there’s not enough money in it for the landowner to put up with the hassle of anglers wondering around their land.
Not sure how the agricultural set aside land grants effect fishing when applied to the river bank, can you fish on set aside land with adjacent river banks?

It’s also just occurred to me that in the 60’s and 70’s there was far more pollution in our rivers and therefore the river’s that were fishable at that time must have been extremely busy, so really Dave with less anglers, more commercial waters and more rivers now fishable, life’s great for the specimen angler.

I was under the impression that the report said "more rivers containing fish" not "more fish in the rivers".

BIG difference!

This report is the 'shot in the arm that angling needs'. My only concern with facts and figures is that we never get them all. We all agree that there are fewer fish in our rivers (reason given for Otters moving inland) so how come there are now more acording to the report. I think it is there are more of the lesser species (minnows etc) and fewer fish that are angled for (Barbel,Chub etc). Also there is no mention of the damage being done by the black plauge to fish stocks or the American Signal crayfish to spawning sites and the banks of the river. I see this as more of a PR excersise for the work done by the EA over the years.
The one good thing is they recognise that the European Eel is in serious trouble. Now that a goverment body has shown this something might be done to improve the situatiion. Lets hope that the powers that be do not let this report sit on the shelf and use it for everybodys benifit.

John,
There were probably a similar number of anglers around 10/15 years ago. I think the main difference then was that carp were very much the in species so there was less pressure on the rivers, if I can remember rightly. Although there wasn't the same number of small commercial fisheries carp fishing was still very popular. I think that the commercial waters of today are great as they fill a need. They are perfect for people who just want to catch loads of fish. There are also some big fish in some of them. Although I do not fish these waters for the carp I sometimes fish them for roach and, in particular, perch. There are some good fish which hardly anybody fishes for. The commercialisation of barbel fishing doesn't do river anglers too many favours as stretches containing barbel have become far too busy for many of us these days. Fortunately it is still possible to find some quiet fishing by avoiding barbe stretches, but this is becomming increasingly difficult. I think the rents are less on the less popular stretches so they are still affordable. Clubs get most of their income from busy waters but they always have a few of us join to fish the less busy waters. We probably would not rejoin these clubs if they only had busy waters so it is worth them keeping these quiet stretches as long as the rent is not too high.
Steve,
I must have misread the report, the magazine came in this morning's post. I thought it said more rivers containing fish AND more fish in the rivers. As you say BIG difference. I will read it again and I hope you are right. Low stock levels are good for big fish and for quiet stretches of river. As long as there are still some fish coming through a combination of quiet waters with big fish and well stocked waters with lots of fish means there is something for everybody.

I read this report yesterday, in depth, from the EA site and I have to say that it totally lacks any substance, except for the licence figures.

If you actually dig deeper into their 'facts' then you will see what I mean.

Try and substantiate the facts about the youth offending numbers.
I've tried, you can't.
It's all hearsay, conjecture and word of mouth.

It looks good on the surface to the outside world, but I'm afraid it lacks any credibility under close scrutiny.

Here's a snip from the report:

"A lack of historic data also means we have no benchmarks against which current population abundance can be compared,"


If you don't know what you had yesterday, how would you know if you had more or less today?

I agree entirely in what Dave says about barbel fishing going the same way as carp fishing.Barbel are now the in fish to a sickening degree. I base my comments on expierience, and not my own selfish needs.

I think the close season must be driving me mad. I have just re-read the magazine and there is nothing in it about the report. I must have read it somewhere else, possibly on the web site.

It's been banded about in the newspapers and on television news programs over the last few days. Maybe that's where you heard it.
..............
Our nations' fisheries report.
That's the title of the report which can be downloaded at the E.A. web site.
I've just done a word search on the whole report and here's what I found:
The word PIKE gets mentioned 5 times
DACE 7
PERCH 9
BARBEL 9
CHUB 11
ROACH 26

TROUT 280
SALMON 310

I reckon the report should be renamed Our nations' trout and salmon report.

The report can be seen here:
http://www.environment-agency.gov.uk/subjects/fish/762572/765866/765645/?version=1&lang=_e
............................


More fish my *rse!!!

I’ve not as yet read this report (will get round to it soon), but I have read many others produced by the EA, probably more than most, and I find that in the main most are lacking in substance, real detail, poor on data and in many cases scientific rigour.

Why this should be I don’t know, but it is, and lets the EA down in my view.
Sooner or later, and if you keep producing rubbish, you lose credibility, and if the EA doesn’t start to produce authoritative quality stuff very soon that’s what will happen to them.
Many big companies who would either intentionally or unintentionally do or river environments harm employ some bright guys. It only takes one or two challenges from these Cos to their sloppy reports, for the message to go out within this community that they’re easy meat because of it. And we’re on a downward slid back into the bad old days of chuck in the river when its up and challenge them through the courts if we get caught.

Bad, bad news that would be for all concerned, in wanting our rivers protecting.

I used to be a club Secretary until quite recently, and found the EA very frustating with regards various angling related issues. In the end they started ignoring my letters, so I stopped writing!

I am not surprised that 'coarse' fish get mentioned so few times, other reports that I have read are virtually 100% game fish orientated, despite these anglers being in a minority. I am a pike angler for much of the season, and it is a well known fact among the PAC that the EA does NOTHING for predator anglers full stop.

In my area the EA has a bylaw which states that all fish must be returned alive to the water except Grayling, Pike and Eels. Why are these 3 species left out?!!!

Add on the fact that if you want to use 3 rods you have to pay for 4, a simple admin change would sort that out, by no, it's just too much trouble!

I also think it would be benificial if the close season was brought back everywhere, but I thing that is probably just a pipe dream.....

I totally agree with Rik that the report lacks and substance and with steve that it has far too much about Salmon and Trout.

I posted the bit below on another thread last Saturday after reading the report:

I've now had a chance to read the report and whilst interesting it is very light on detail.

The EA consented to the stocking of 7.5 million fish in 2002/2003. The report acknowledges that stocking can cause various problems including increased incidence of disease and hyridisation (goldfish). It notes that stocking of fish can change the existing fish community structure in waters and that can adversely affect fishery performance and aquatic ecology. In other words stocking to cure a problem way itself cause more serious problems.

Neting and electro fishing consents were up by 75% over the last three years and stocking consents were up by 21% in tge same period. The EA seemed to conclude that this might be due to the process being simplified and more stocking being declared. They didn't seem to consider the possiblity that it was due to more stocking happening and that there might be an underlying reason for that.

Whilst the EA surveyed a lot of rivers they surveyed only 260 stillwaters and stated "Most of our information on course fishery performance is from rivers."

The report expresses concern about recruitment amongst fish populations. ""many rivers across England and Wales still have depleted course fish populations and, in particular, sufffer from poor recruitment (juvenille survival). This in spite of what at first may appear to be satisfactory water quality, flow and physical habitat suggesting there must be other factors affecting fish populations,"

The report then goes off on what appears to be a completely illogical tangent by suggesting that endochrine distruptors may be the problem. Whilst long term the presence of endochrine distruptors may result in serious problems the current recruitment problems are not due to failure to spawn as there are plenty of fry around each year. The recruitment problem is caused by the subsequent mortality rates among young fish. Strangely the EA doesn't consider the possibility that the problem might be losses caused by fish being eaten by, or dying from damage inflicted by, cormorants. Nor is the effect of crayfish on recruitment considered.

Indeed the report only very briefly mentions cormorants and suggests that numbers have now stabilised. Amazingly the report admits "The Agency does not monitor cormorant numbers but relies on data collected by ornithological organisations."

They suggest that there are only 1500 nesting pairs in the UK and a further 15,000 that over-winter on inland waters. I find those numbers very hard to believe they seem extremely low and the populations I have come across over the last few years have all been growing.

Apparently the European poulation is estimated at between 250,000 and 300,000 birds.

The report mentions that cormorants eat 1lb of fish each a day. Even using the EA's rather modest estimates of cormorant numbers that would mean that in the UK cormorants eat an average of 7 tonnes of fish a day during the winter.

The Cormorants throughout Europe have also been estimated to be currently consuming between 1800 and 9000 tonnes of Eels per year.

Oh and I was interested to read that Carp, Orfe, Goldfish and Rainbow Trout are "ordinarily resident to England and Wales". I could see why they had Carp and Rainbow trout defined in that way but not Goldfish and Orfe which are both ornamental fish bred from Brown Goldfish and Ide respectively.

The crucian problem is very briefly discussed but the conclusions of the Hull research of last summer are not. The disappearing Rudd is not mentioned.

Nice report shame about the general lack of substance. Could have been a lot better.

I think I have got the general idea of things now. Once the cute, cuddly otters that the do-gooders have re-introduced have fininshed eating all the chub and barbel the EA can get together with English Nature and not allow chub and barbel to be re-stocked in the rivers. Then make sure that more trout and salmon are in the rivers for the yuppies to fish for. Charge them a vast sum to fish and use the money from this for pay rises for EA chiefs. Any stretches of river that are not entirely taken over by trout and salmon anglers should have cycle paths alongside them so our leader, Princess Tony, can encourage all and sundry along the banks. The chub and barbel that cannot be put in the rivers because English Nature say so can then be put into carp puddles so they can be caught time and time again in massive bags. Loads more matches can be held on these waters. Those who do not like this type of (Angling?) will not be able to retreat to the pub to get away from it as the pubs will all be converted to food pubs or theme pubs. So they will just have to lump it and catch their stillwater barbel. They can always read books about how river fishing used to be. Cynical, moi? Big Des would be proud of me :0)

I appreciate what you'e saying Dave.