Wintle's World of Angling

Mark,

Another evocative and thought provoking article.
How you manage to maintain this high standard every week is simply amazing.

Most of my own catches of big roach were in Norway where there is little or no over-fishing at all so my experiences are very different to yours, however, I wonder how many anglers in the UK have ever taken 10 two pound roach in a single session?

I am interested in the syndicate that you mentioned.
I am a member of an Avon syndicate where there is a good balance between fly and coarse anglers and indeed it is a rare occasion when I will see even one other angler on the river. The stock of Chub, Dace and Barbel have not declined over the 5 years of my membership and if anything the average sizes of the Chub in particular have actually increased.

I am not sure that we will ever agree on the topic of keep nets, but the continuing discussion is highly enjoyable.

Another well thought out article Mark. I have to agree if people want to catch big bags of fish day in day out why dont they fish the commercials. This is after all what they were set up for.

I have to agree with you on the river access a club water i fish as to points of access. The top farm access is a half mile walk to the river and as such gets lightly fished as the bottom farm access allows you to park on the bank. The adjacent half dozen swims have anglers in them nearly every day. Might i had with enought gear for a week give me a rod a small bag and a enjoyable stroll from swim to swim.

Keep up the good work Mark i look forward to your next article.

Mark,
An excellent article and very well put. Oddly enough I was thinking of writing something similar, but I could not have worded it near as well as what you have. I only hope that lots of people read this article and take notice of it, before they destroy their own sport completely.

For a long time now I have thought that maybe Mark and I are singing on the same hymn sheet. Now I am convinced.

You have put in eloquent words what a few of us have been thinking for years Mark.

I boils down to the numbers game, and whether we really have anything to prove by being match anglers or big fish or bust merchants.

Make no mistake I have done the big fish lark, many times in my life. In fact I even formed a specimen group, some of the members being instrumental in the formation of a National Association at the time.

After many years of angling I realise sometimes how futile such ideas have become, and indeed did we really create a monster. Even **** Walker, the doyen of the modern angling big fish scene, wept with disapproval on several occasions, on how it had developed.

One the match angling scene, a form of angling I have never been against, the modern attitude, is often offensive. I put the fault here squarely at the modern angling press. The terms: "Bag Up", "Sitting on a Shedful" and "Attack your swim", are symptomatic of misdirected modern angling attitudes. This goes hand in hand of course with the commercial waters full of carp where photos are often published showing anglers holding up vast quantities of keepnetted carp.

I do use a keepnet from time to time yet I could never put 100lbs of fish in one.

What for? Who are you really impressing.

Many of us, are what is termed good anglers. Make no mistake, many of us are quite capable of catching 10 two pound roach at a sitting, provided we could get on the waters containing them. And I do not want to deprecate your great catches Mark, but we should not be too upset if lots of us never catch a two pound roach in our lives. Certainly the roach waters I am fishing these days may never produce such a fish, but whilst I am catching the odd 11/2 pounder together with a few fish of over the pound to complement them, I am happy.

And most of the time I don't use a keepnet, not because I am against them, but because I am on the move most of the time and keepnets are horrible things to cart around.

Returning to match fishing, I have often wondered if it might be possible to limit a fishing match to say 1 hour, or two hours at the most.

And to make it a point a fish, irrespective of size. There would be less damage done to large fish in keepnets.

Ron,

Rather than see matches limited to 1 or 2 hours I would far rather see a little more education on the technique of correctly setting out a keep net, particularly on Rivers.

Last season I saw an lot of poorly set keepnets but mostly the owners were pleased to receive some friendly advice.
I even had one chap who told me that he had often wondered why his hard fished for Dace often jumped the net!

I must say Mark that the southern rivers seem to receive a lot more pressure than the midland ones, Severn, Avon, Trent and Wye. I've commented before on this site about how few people fish the rivers these days and the only river that does get a bit of pressure is the Teme. I think thats mainly down to easy access, though it is a beautiful little river I admit. Maybe its something to do with 'hotspots' or big fish being caught or is it just reputation, I dunno. It is a fact nevertheless

Graham,

The angling pressure here varies enormously, from the very popular middle part of Throop and the Royalty, to stretches of the upper Stour that I sometimes think no one but me fish at all. On the last Saturday of the season I saw no other anglers on 3 stretches above Blandford.

For Ron some explanation;

At the opposite extreme, the big catch of roach I took many years ago came from a free stretch of fishing where the best swim is actually in the car park. At that time that swim was fished by up to four anglers every day through each winter yet that catch was, and remains the best ever from the river. All of the exceptional catches were by the tiny minority of exceptional roach anglers (Bob Mousley, Peter Wheat are anglers who got 8 & 6 respectively); the same is true of the great catches on the Hampshire Avon, the great names come up every time when it comes to big catches of roach over 2lbs (L A Parker, Howes, Mills, Gough, Sawyer, Howard, Searle). Why it is so hard to consistently get a massive catch of very big roach from a river would take a book to explain but otherwise ask yourself how many catches of 10 2lb roach have been taken in the last 50 years from the Frome, Stour and Avon (the answer is very few). Certainly in my case, the heavy pressure made the roach very difficult but not impossible to tempt.