River Crisis

GrahamM · Oct 14, 2004

I can concur with much of what Mark says. There are miles of the Dove that are so overgrown you need a machete to find the river. And that will remain so until those stretches are populated with the number and size of fish that most anglers want to catch.

It's a double-edged sword, for if some of the stretches do become popular that will take the shine off fishing them for many anglers who love the solitude. No named fish on rivers? Tell that to 'The Traveller' and his mates on a certain stretch of the Great Ouse.

Yet the danger, as mark says, is that if we don't fish such stretches in greater numbers the clubs will stop renting them and they will become abandoned altogether.

My own view is that many of these stretches will just become syndicated and only available to those who can afford a big fee.

Maybe that is not such a bad thing in some instances.

Peter Jacobs · Oct 14, 2004

Graham,

I failed to see that you had started a thread on Mark's excellent and evocative article.
Do you think that you could move my comments into this thread and delete the one that I started?

GrahamM · Oct 14, 2004

Sorry Peter, I can only move whole threads. Just copy your message on to this thread and I'll delete your other one. I'm off out now. Yep, fishing.

Ron Troversial Clay · Oct 14, 2004

I also agree with what Mark has said. I am by nature an all rounder, but I prefer river fishing above all.

As regards the River Don. This stream has started to produce excellent angling with chub to over 5 pounds, roach to nearly 2 lbs, perch to 4 lbs (that's right 4 lbs) and barbel to double figures. In addition there are lots of dace and wild brown trout. In some parts the Don looks like the Hampshire Avon with golden gravel runs and streamer weed.

Yet here again the river is hardly fished, which is a shame, certainly that is so in my area.

One of the main problems with the Don is access. Some of the best stretches are actually right in the centre of Rotherham, where the council - Labour run of course, refuse point blank to make the river accessable to anglers. What they do not realise is that if they made angling on the Don more available, they would take lots of yobbos off the streets and enable pensioners, who cannot afford, or have lost the ability to drive their own transport, to have fabulous fishing.

It's a shame, it really is.

Peter Jacobs · Oct 14, 2004

I think that syndicates are not such a bad thing when you consider the alternative of loosing the fishing if the local clubs cannot afford the leases.

In fact, not all syndicates are all that expensive either, I am a member of a syndicate that has almost 3 miles of both banks of the Hampshire Avon.
The annual cost is ?185 which is really only just over ?5 per week considering a 9 month season. Now, ?5 just about buys a packet of cigarettes or about one and a half pints of bitter at my local pub, so the same amount spent for a lovely stretch of unspoiled Avon is a bargain in my book.

Mark's comments about the Stour can be equally applicable to the Hampshire Avon as well.
Last season JP put me onto a lovely looking stretch of the CAC's water where even Mark's peg cutting tool would have struggled, and this was at the end of a decent summer.
It was obvious that no one had fished this stretch probably since the start of the season.

Personally, I think it is rather sad that unless a river has a known population of big Barbel and/or Chub that a lot of river anglers will not give it a second look. The sad part is that they miss out on some really great Roach and Dace fishing.

Graham Whatmore · Oct 14, 2004

I have made comments on various threads about the dangers of underfished rivers and the clubs being unable to afford the lease. Its fine at the moment if you're a riverman, you have all the room in the world but it just cannot be sustained.

A big club like Birmingham A.A. faces increasing costs and a diminishing membership and you don't need to be an accountant to know what the outcome of that is. This is a club that survives on a book that is made up of mainly river venues, some canal waters and only 5 pools, two of which are rarely if ever fished. They used to have far more river venues than they have now including water on the Wye and numerous small Welsh rivers, all sadly gone now.

What can be done to save all these fantastic river fisheries? I don't know the answer to that but maybe it would be a better proposition to have large Amalgamations with larger incomes. Also, most of the rivers now are totally impractical as salmon fisheries, the Wye is a prime example of that, and the syndicates that once controlled most of the Wye no longer exist. The landowners have lost that income and probably can ill afford it so maybe theres an avenue to be explored as day ticket venues rather than paying for a lease.

One thing for sure is that rivers are no longer used as match fisheries like they were in the past and maybe its time we River guys put our hands in our pockets and paid a fee for a days pleasure fishing over and above the cost of a club licence. I for one wouldn't object to that if it meant keeping the venues available.

Baz · Oct 14, 2004

Another possibility for a club loseing stretches of river is the publication it gets.
I am really suprised that farmers/landowners have not latched on yet to the bigger money that could be made by leasing to a syndicate rather than a club.
A syindicate might suit some people, but it would take more affordable fishing away from a lot of others.
And there are clubs who have a no publicity policy for this very reason.

Graham Whatmore · Oct 14, 2004

The one problem with syndicate waters is, you are at the mercy of the landowner as to how much he charges and then increases those charges yearly for exactly the same water. Outlay for the landowner - nil, profit - 100%, don't like it? fine I'll get another syndicate.

Baz · Oct 14, 2004

All syndicates will be playing the same game though Graham.
I don't think I will be in any hurry to pay syndicate prices , while their is no need to.
What I said in the above thread was, the way some anglers are carrying on, they will force the price of fishing up themselves. Where is the sense in that?

Jeff (Cheeky Monkey) Woodhouse · Oct 14, 2004

Amalgamations are certainly a positive solution. Take a case with our association.

We have three clubs each with a short stretch of the River Colne and each charging about the same subscription. But they have their own overheads to cover which are probably almost three times what they would be if they amalgamated. Also, if they amalgamated every member would have three different stretches to choose from instead of the one they have at present.

So what stops this? Pride, secrecy, protectionism, or simply the name? Cobblers! They can all get together at our meetings and why don't the choose a more general name, eg: "Colne Fishers", rather than tying the club to an area ro district?

Would it matter to our association? NO! We'd lose maybe ?20 on the two clubs registration fees and perhaps a few members might be a member of two of the clubs at the moment. In future they'd only have to join the one so we might see a slight drop in subs there, but I'd rather that than see these clubs continually struggling to balance the books.

And wouldn't it be more attractive for other? One club - three waters.

Mel Crighton · Oct 14, 2004

A few months back I approached a farmer regarding the lease of a stretch of river,I had visons of using it for a disabled fishing syndicate it had good access and concrete roads to the river,, the only thing that it needed was a good clean up and a few platforms built this was put to the farmer that we would do as needed for a reduction of the cast for the first year, the answer was yes you can do the work but what ever you do will belong to me and no reduction in the cost we saw this as a possible scam as he was virtually telling us what and where things were to be so we let this go, our current situations is we are still looking.

Graham Whatmore · Oct 14, 2004

How right you are Jeff, theres an awful lot of silly pride in fishing isn't there? Wouldn't you think that, in this day and age, we would have gotten over all those silly prejudices. How often have we seen the phrase 'fishermen are their own worst enemies', but it still applies.

Baz · Oct 14, 2004

I could see clubs going the way Jeff suggested, it would be better and safer for angling all round.
At the moment some clubs are a lot stronger financially than others. Maybe the club with the most finances would want the biggest say if they amalgamated, this is where the problems would be.

Peter (the Tackle Tart) Jacobs · Oct 15, 2004

So, what is the big difference between a club and a syndicate then?

Largely, clubs have unlimited membership and a variety of waters.
However, even some of the largest clubs in my area (CAC for example) have in recent years put a moritorium on a maximum of 2,500 members, so, was the CAC a club or just a large syndicate?

A syndicate is typically a smaller group with a single venue that usually has a set number of members which cannot be exceeded. More often than not a syndicate is a lot easier to administer as it will typically be a group of very like minded indiviuals who target similar species, whereas a club has to cater for all factions from Carp angler throuhg to match anglers.

As to cost, there is little difference in the total amount; CAC approx 120 pounds per annum whilst my syndicate is 185 pounds per annum.
Not too much difference there either.

I do believe that the way forward for some (and I don't mean ALL) rivers is to see an increase in small syndicates with relatively small lengths of the river. They need not cost a fortune to belong to as each stretch will probably only have one riparian owner.

Interesting topic Mark, thanks.

Graham Whatmore · Oct 15, 2004

I know where you are coming from Peter but think about this, assuming that rivers eventually become mostly syndicate waters:-

If you join a syndicate that has 40 pegs on a stretch of river and you pay ?150 p.a. what then happens if you want to fish somewhere else but you can't because all the river is syndicated and has restricted membership? Theres usually a great long waiting list on the best waters, even dead mans boots, so you can't up and join these types of waters can you?

This means that your fishing becomes very restricted and you can kiss goodbye to fishing holidays for a start. If you are of limited income and can only afford even one syndicate membership you then spend all your fishing time on a 40 peg stretch and I couldn't imagine a worse hell than that.

Hyperthetical situations like that would be the death of fishing as we know it and it would become a very exclusive pastime. 'Most money wins Rodney'. Of course there would be a very few big clubs that would survive but the pressure to join them would mean they would have to restrict membership, so, essentially they become a syndicate as well.

Not a happy future if that were to happen is it Peter?

Nigel Connor(ACA ,SAA) · Oct 15, 2004

I'm not sure that due attention has been paid to Mark's comment that if leases lapse then farmers may allow access on an informal basis or I suppose if they wanted on a day -ticket basis.I know from my days in Yorkshire that some very good river fishing was available on this basis.

Would this not open up more rivers to fishing in that you could pick & choose where you fished as opposed to being limited to your club stretches.

Ultimately unless more anglers target the rivers then stretches will revert back to nature.

Peter (the Tackle Tart) Jacobs · Oct 15, 2004

Graham, I totally agree that your scenario would indeed be a very sad state of affairs and one that I hope never comes to fruition.

Currently on the Hampshire Avon we are still very lucky inasmuch as we still have 2 large clubs with many stretches and several smaller clubs with only one or two. On top of that there are a few syndicates, one of which is sadly a dead-mans-shoes- entry system with a waiting list of several years.

I don't pretend to have any firm answer to the problem but one thing is certain and that is no one can force an angler onto a river, and with the prospects of better match catches I don't see many new matches being organised on the rivers.

Other than a few trips a year onto stillwaters for Tench, and a few pole only trips, I do tend to stay on the river both for coarse and fly fishing.

I can totally understand people being a little "anti" syndicate, my main aim was to point out that they are not necessarily prohibitively expensive, nor are they all restrictive in nature. However, I can only speak from my own experiences in the Wessex/Hampshire areas.

Peter (the Tackle Tart) Jacobs · Oct 15, 2004

Nigel,

I would love to see some form of day ticket arrangement happening, but I wonder how this would be administered?

We both know that the Bisterne system works well, but then that is an established fishery, for a landowner to pur something similar in place might not work and biliffing would probably be out of the question as well.

There are a few stretches that I would be very interested in though if this were to be the case.

stu · Oct 15, 2004

I am not sure I really understand what the crisis is?

In many ways, the thought of finding a superb river (near me) like the Dove, which is overgrown and hardly fished is seventh heaven. I don't really care if the fish are not record breakers.

The only "real" river near me is the River Lea, and this is heavily fished, so I'd welcome more seclusion.

If it means more smaller syndicates, then fine. At the end of the day if anglers prefer commercial still waters (or just still waters) then those wanting to fish rivers will just have to find a different way to gain access to the waters.

On a final note, its my view that as anglers we have had it easy in terms of paying a "going rate" for fishing. Most clubs my way are in the ?50 per season bracket. RMC is ?100 for ALL their waters except the syndicates. Frankly I think that is dirt cheap and we need to get real about club fees, especially when you add up how much people spend on gear, baits and ?10 day tickets on commercial waters.

Graham Whatmore · Oct 15, 2004

Peter, I'm not in any way anti syndicate in the present climate in fact I'd willingly pay ?185 to join one like yours even though I couldn't fish it all that often. It would be a different matter if the whole of the Avon was syndicated though because that would mean occasional visitors like me would never be allowed to fish it, neither would you be able to fish a different river. As it is now there are very few day ticket waters on the Hants Avon, imagine if there were none at all.

I suggested in my first post that maybe going down the day ticket route would be a better proposition and I don't think theres a better alternative. If ALL the clubs in the country opened ALL their waters to day tickets it would generate more income than they can muster at present from club membership fees.

Take your water for instance Peter. If they allowed 10 day tickets per week (not enough to ruin it for members) and charged ?10 per ticket that would generate ?5200 per year. Not a fortune I know, but its ?5200 more than they get now.

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