Match Fishing

I wasn't sure where to start this thread off in. It's about Match Fishing, but It's about Match Fishing for Carp on a commercial fishery. If its placed in the wrong section then please remove and relocate.

Last Saturday i fished a friendly match (pub mates) at Alders Farm, which i believe is in Bedfordshire, but it may be Bucks, either way it is not to far from Milton Keynes or Luton so most reading this drivel with get the drift i hope.

Alders is one of those venues that appears in small print every week in the comics showing catch weights of 200Ib plus for a 5 hour match. It's a small complex of Lakes (ponds), very pretty, out in the countryside.

We had a great breakfast which at ?5 knocks the Little Chef into a cocked H, and it is served in an old rustic wooden pump house which sits at the side of the pond, so not far to walk with the gear afterwards. Lovely.

The match was won by Martin Foster (1/2) to his mates with 198Ib and a bit.
2nd was with 180Ib, 3rd 140Ib etc. You get the picture I hope.

The problem for me were the fish!!!

I actually caught a few, which had been proper hooked but it was difficult to remove the hook because there was no mouth as such to remove it from. With Big Carp they have been called Parrots and the like, but these were 2 to 8 pounders. They had no Lips at all, just a horrible blackened Leslie Ash type pout.

Others I saw during the weigh ins had little or no pecs left, split tails, half tails, missing an eye!!!!! I'm not lying here this is Gospel.

I will never fish there again whilst it is the way it is.

But I do like match fishing, I like to be in a match where big weights are about and I do like commercials for the convienience of Parking, Breakfast etc, etc, but this sickened me and I wont be going back.

There are loads of matches these days where the weight is made up of Carp only and I'm sure that some of the fisheries have it right, but what do we do about the ones like Alders that are getting it all wrong?.

"Others I saw during the weigh ins had little or no pecs left, split tails, half tails, missing an eye!!!!! I'm not lying here this is Gospel."

I would imagine this type of damage comes from foul hooking, which is oviously going to be fairy common when you are fishing in "Carp soup".

I don't feel easy about these "bagging" venues, I have never fished one and don't realy want to. When I fished matches regulary on natural waters 20lb was considered a decent days fishing. Now when you look through match results you don't even see any winners with less than 50lb!

Another thing about some of these kinds of places where they boast hugh catch results, is that the fish are packed in so tight they have a high mortality rate. But do we ever hear of it? no we don't.
They also never get any form of diseases, just a garaunteed big catch. It's about time they were inspected on a regular basis and close down.
I wonder when, how, and where they get rid of dead or dyeing fish stocks, as not too many people seem to notice anything bad about them.

Remember the fish kill in the Cheshire area recently? There were lots of dead F1 hybrids netted out of the Weaver system, strange really, seeeing that there has never been a section 30 for stocking them in there in the first place.

Did you draw the owner/managers attention to the state of the fish and register your disgust to him ??

I know you are not asking me that question Ed, but in the past when I have pointed out to a private water owner about dead and dyeing fish in his lake, I have been offered free fishing to keep my mouth shut. But it didn't do him any good. I was on the NRA at the time.
Can't name the water but it has been asked about on this forum a couple of times.

Ed, when pointed out to the owner they said that the damage had been caused by pleasure anglers using strong lines and big hooks and striking into fish which had already nearly pulled the rod in. They said that the less educated anglers were now being taught some basic tactics and fish care. I asked if the damaged fish could not be removed and put out to pasture so to speak, but they have no other water which is not fished.

Murray they will be kept there until to big to be classed as match then they will go to a big carp water where us big carpers will get the blame for the parrot mouths !

Probably Cakester

Cakey, you got it bang on mate!

Cakey, Malc.

I thought that the EA rules on fish movement made it all most impossible to do as you suggest.

I know british waterways wanted to move their carp from drayton reservoir to a specimen carp water but were not allowed to do so.

Do you know of any places where this has happened?

i noticed a similar problem on a water near blackpool, the owner had a meeting with the matchman, told them to behave or else. see what next season brings.

Er, Joskin, they were allowed to do so, and did mate! I live 300 yards from the place! RMC had em if I remember correctly!

There ya go, click here

I thought that they had only managed to find a suitable location for just a few of the Drayton carp I didnt realise it was that many. Did they remove them all Malc?

Apparently the original stocking was 50,000 Carp. I read some where that they wanted to relocate all of them and replace them with small carp again but could only find a suitable location for a small percentage of them. (I guess that small percentage went to RMC)

Murray......but you are an angler, the breakfast alone would probably satisfy most of todays "fishermen"......would most really give a damn about the fish?....personally bacon buttys on a bunson burner and the odd wild carp would do me!
Times they are a changing......as on great man once said.

Ah found the answer to my question on the same RMC site.

http://www.rmcangling.co.uk/show.phtml?ID=630

There were complications and most of the fish remained in Drayton.

Do fish get moved from so called bagging waters to Specimen lakes regularly?
I would have thought that most specimen carp waters wouldnt take the risk.

Joskin.......i don't know the destination of drayton fish, but who decides what a "small" percantage is?.....but didn't RMC always push the fact they reared their own?

you got nothing better to do either mate?