Set Lines

Just been for a Day out on a local Reservoir,just out of Littleborough,and got talking to one of the Carp boys,apprently yesterday he was fishing on the members only bank, when he was approached by a foreigner, who looked very out of place, asking if he had any fish for sale, (broken English, sounded Polish or something similar apparently ) Anyway, this foreigner was hanging around for quite some time,then eventually walked off,well, the angler was walking the banks later and found 4 set lines, armed with multiple hooks, he did not say what they were baited with.
I do know that this water is well bailiffed,but not overly fished,and is quite well out of the way, so these guys must be activly seeking out such waters to illegaly take fish.....I am not pointing fingers of guilt at any particular nationality ,but it makes you think when this kind of thing is happening so close to home.
A good time to check out your local waters I think, and what is happening to the rivers whilst there arent any anglers around I wonder ?

That is my fear, whilst the decent angler's leave the water's for the closed season, they are then left wide open to abuse.
It must be like going on holiday and leaving your front door open.
They must be rubbing there hand's together with delight.

We had problems of set lines on our local club water.......more than 15 years ago...it was locals . They also managed to massacre a good number of wildfowl we had introduced onto the water to demonstrate that angling is very conservation minded. (Our conservation efforts even got local t.v.coverage -sadly the actions of the local yobbery didn't)

Jeff, a good point about waters shut over close season.

Makes no difference.Most rivers are so rarely fished that you could find places where you would not see a soul in August never mind April.

Set lines; bolt rigs, Carp fishing??

"Set lines; bolt rigs, Carp fishing??"

Pretty much the same.........
Ron has been saying the same thing for years

Peter Stone was adamant that setting up a bolt rig and leaving it with the intention that a fish hook itself was just another form of set line.

It wasn't so much myself Ed, it was Peter's comments to me one June morning as we sat tench fishing and after I asked him his thoughts on the modern carp fishing scene.

At about that time there appeared an article followed by a series of letters in the Angling Star about the roach bolt rig - the "bow string short paternoster heavy feeder" style that is used today by many anglers after big roach on large still waters. The writer of the article stated that it was "catching fish on your own terms."

The concept is no more than a modern variation of the rig I described in 1973 that was being used, and had been used for donkey's years in South Africa and was called a "Trap".

It was interesting to note that even in those far off days, many South African anglers also believed that such ideas were not in the concept of "fair angling with rod and line."

What I can't undertand is, why is it that threads like this still don't bang the message home to some individuals about posting locations, or putting photo's of fishing hotspots up on this forum, isn't a good idea.