My generation...

I am worried about the future of angling, I think that rivers and canals will be left neglected and lots of clubs up and down the country will be abandoned and shut down. I am 15 and I hardly know anyone who goes fishing on rivers and canals, all anyone cares about are carp, and fishing on commercials. They have no interest in any other species of fish, except for barbel, however they just go for the carp because it is 'too hard' to fish on rivers and they 'cant be arsed' with the sometimes longer than average walks. I find this very worrying because if more young anglers don't start fishing rivers and canals then many clubs will suffer, not to mention the match scene on the natural venues. I love fishing natural venues, as I find the fishing more challenging and satisfying than in a stocked lake, not that I have any problems with these lakes, I just worry that they will be the only that will be fished, in say, 70 years time. Im sorry if im sounding negative and I am sure that other young anglers do fish rivers and canals, but they don't near me. I think the main reason is that on a natural venue, experience helps allot, however for the young angler it is unlikely that they will be experienced enough to 'guarantee' that they catch something. However this is where commercials come in, because you are virtually guaranteed to catch something, as long as you put some sort of bait on your hook. I am ever more worried about fly fishing, if I ask them about that they say 'isn't that for posh people' or that 'it's too hard' to cast...
cheers

Interesting post frederico. As i dont fish commies at all and im nearly 50 too it would be difficult for me to write a post like that without being accused of stereotyping or assuming things.

Maybe they will get bored of catching same old carp after a few years and look for some other challenges. Maybe as they got older they will look for tranquility and isolation where they fish - perhaps theyre scared of that while young?

In the meantime, at least on the canals and rivers we can all get the best swims!

A very perceptive veiw from one so young! well said young man.

Cheer up Freddie lad, theirs no need to be so glum. These things go in cycles, it's only a matter of time before the great unwashed rediscover the challenge river fishing offers and will be flocking back to the rivers in their droves.
In the meantime make the best of the opportunity you have to plunder the deserted banks.

flightliner said:

A very perceptive veiw from one so young! well said young man.

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I totally agree, it is sad not to see the younger generation on the rivers.

What a marvellous post! Bravo - and well said young man; maybe there IS hope for the future of angling after all...

ian_welch said:

What a marvellous post! Bravo - and well said young man; maybe there IS hope for the future of angling after all...

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Hear hear; post of the month in my view Ian . . . . . . .

If a few matches were held on rivers would that change anything

Great thread Fred, I'm more than happy for the Carp army to stay off the river.
Most mornings I have the river to myself.

What a brilliant post.
Jerry

my sentiments entirely young sir, when I was your age there was no commercial fisheries as such. So i did most of my fishing was done on ponds and rivers such as the river idle, river witham, river trent, river till. In the last 20 or 25 years or so I,ve many changes ie the trend towards carp fishing, since the decline of the rivers when fish were getting fewer and big weights were no longer the norm commercials came on the scene and were a god send to match anglers. which in turn meant big weights of stockie carp which have now grown into bigger carp which means even bigger weights ie 200 to 350lbs being caught, which also means our rivers have been neglected in the passed 20 years. I used to love fishing the rivers idle and till in winter where the roach fishing was 2nd to none, but now they are a sorry sight to behold, I walked the till for a few miles recently looking for some fishable areas but all i found was a silted up river with little or no flow and a bank to bank carpet of lilly pads and totaly unfishable. the river witham which used to have matches on it from lincoln to boston every week end but is now deserted except for few anglers. the mighty trent is the same but for a few of us river men are still fishing it. So you see young man there is some fish to be caught in our rivers so do,nt give up trying and I hope you enjoy your fishing as much as I do. good luck and tight lines. mick redfin.

frederico said:

I am worried about the future of angling, I think that rivers and canals will be left neglected and lots of clubs up and down the country will be abandoned and shut down. I am 15 and I hardly know anyone who goes fishing on rivers and canals, all anyone cares about are carp, and fishing on commercials. They have no interest in any other species of fish, except for barbel, however they just go for the carp because it is 'too hard' to fish on rivers and they 'cant be arsed' with the sometimes longer than average walks. I find this very worrying because if more young anglers don't start fishing rivers and canals then many clubs will suffer, not to mention the match scene on the natural venues. I love fishing natural venues, as I find the fishing more challenging and satisfying than in a stocked lake, not that I have any problems with these lakes, I just worry that they will be the only that will be fished, in say, 70 years time. Im sorry if im sounding negative and I am sure that other young anglers do fish rivers and canals, but they don't near me. I think the main reason is that on a natural venue, experience helps allot, however for the young angler it is unlikely that they will be experienced enough to 'guarantee' that they catch something. However this is where commercials come in, because you are virtually guaranteed to catch something, as long as you put some sort of bait on your hook. I am ever more worried about fly fishing, if I ask them about that they say 'isn't that for posh people' or that 'it's too hard' to cast...
cheers

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Frederico - you are 15, enjoy your fishing. You can't explain 'people'. Whilst there aren't the numbers of anglers on rivers and canals that there once were, there are still a core of anglers who fish them; maybe you and others like you will join the ranks..

times change , the world changes , if you are only 15 then get out and enjoy yourself and enjoy being outside you will have plenty of time when you are older to worry about the future of angling.

I quite often see kids fishing the canal and river around here, although admittedly that may be down to the fact that no bailiffs patrol this area and the fishing is therefore essentially free.

You're right Frederico, but it's not too long since there was a thriving river match scene in our area. If you read my ramblings from the mid-Marsdenian era of FM you'll notice that on many stretches of river it was difficult to fish at weekends because of the match bookings. These small club matches were fished by lads and dads and so youngsters learnt the basic skills necessary to fish moving water. Even your local club had regular matches on their stretches of the Wharfe. Over the past ten years there has been a steady move over to commercials, mainly because they provide a level playing field, giving everyone (or so they think) an equal chance.

Titus says (tongue in cheek?) not to worry as the pendulum will swing back towards river fishing and all will be well. I'm not so sure and if we use my magic ball (the one on the left) to peer forward 40 years to when you are the age I am now what will we see? Many of your local rivers will be strictly private salmon and trout preserves: the Wharfe above Boston Spa, The Nidd from Skip Bridge upwards, the Ure above Ripon, the Swale above Helperby, the Aire above Leeds. Your grandkids will be taking live brain dumps from Totalitarian Carpers and will sneer at any fish under 60lb. Most of their fishing will be virtual via a live feed from the local hub, although they will occasionaly book an hour in the speci pool at Wetherby baths in the hope of catching Big Gut, the local 100.

So how can my generation give you some hope for the future? It's not that hard really. We already run taster sessions for kids on local lakes, we just need to extend this to trips out to the nearest river. We need to get clubs involved in the process and encourage them to get parents engaged. Without a strong club interest in rivers and river fishing then we will increasingly lose prime stretches to private interest. This is already happening on the Yorkshire rivers and we are seeing clubs like Leeds and District giving up many of their best river fisheries and building carp fisheries.

I can't help you on fly fishing - I think that that battle is already lost.

Agree with all that's been said but there are commercials and then there are commercials.Not all are muddy holes full of nobbut parrot beaked carp and I am hopeful of a move toward more sensitively managed stillwaters offering a wider variety of fishing......whether that happens or not IMO largely depends on who owns them but I could see that happening in the future. I hope so anyway....some are a pleasure to fish....some are a nightmare but I feel a balance will be found.

As for the rivers I'm afraid I think they are largely lost.Predation,extraction,non-access [ or whatever] has and will increasingly take its toll. I was brought up on rivers and they are my first love but I hardly fish them anymore. There are loads of reasons for that but I suppose the main one is that they simply don't offer the quality of fishing that they used to...and I dont think they ever will again...not consistently any way. All rivers have their "special" periods but they dont last.Contrast the Ouse of [say] 12 years ago and the Trent currently. The bigger rivers have a better chance ...the smaller ones are doomed IMO assuming they dont just dry up completely.

I can envisage a situation in the not too distant future when there will be very few anglers capable of fishing running water with a running line. Who'd have thought that could ever happen eh ? Sadly I think angling in the future will be almost exclusively stillwater based. I just hope there will be something other than carp to catch.

Sean Meeghan said:

Your grandkids will be taking live brain dumps from Totalitarian Carpers and will sneer at any fish under 60lb.

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I wouldn`t be so sure about that. A couple of weeks ago a mate of mine who I go fishing with brought a young lad (I think he`s about 12 or 13) along on one of our trips. We were fishing a small farm pond and the young lad was using a whip and catching small roach and perch. After a while he came over to me and chatted for a bit, he was telling me about a 14lb carp he`d caught on a recent holiday.

Sometime later I caught a small F1 of about 1 1/2lbs and he came over to take a look

"Oh wow, that`s mint!" was his comment.

I`ll freely admit I don`t fish with young kids very often so I`ve no idea how typical his reaction was but given that he`d caught a much bigger fish I was pleasantly surprised by his reaction and hopefully it shows that not every kid has to catch huge fish to be impressed.

Another incident that springs to mind is when a few weeks ago I went up to my local lake. A father and son set up a peg down from me. This lad couldn`t have been much older than 7 or 8 and even though the young lad was a little noisy I couldn`t help but smile as I heard him frequently shouting out the score between him and his dad (the youngster was out catching his dad by some way). The carp he was catching were stockies in the 1-2lb range but he was loving each and every fish and tbh I don`t think it would have mattered if the fish had been 1-2oz each, he was just enjoying being out with his dad and of course that he was catching more than him.

Now I`ll admit that both my examples are from ponds/lakes but what really matters is that both youngsters were enjoying their fishing. I can`t tell what will happen in the future with those kids but hopefully they`ll continue to fish for many years to come and if they do I`m sure that at some time they`ll try their hand at river fishing. We might never see the numbers of the past on the rivers but I doubt that the art of river fishing will ever die out completely. Indeed the OP`s post proves that more than anything.

Great insightful post Freddie, as a young man I guess your wanting some company on the rivers/canals by people of your own age?

Sure you do its only natural, it was the same when I was growing up in the 60's walking the 6 mile round trip after school with my mates to the local pond or catching a bus at the weekend to fish on the rivers. Great times and fond memories. Unfortunately with the advent of commercials all that has now changed, as you say all they want to do these days is become an instant carp angler!

But its not just the young ones...
I introduced a couple of my mates to angling about 3 years ago (one 44 the other 57), started with a couple of float fishing sessions on the canal and trotting on the rivers, they caught very little between them but did enjoy it immensely and started to equip themselves with rods, reels and such but then it all changed!

After subsequently catching carp on commercials one guy is now a "avid carper" and other carp/pike angler who still likes the odd day on the river and the canal pike.
One of our other mates is known as the "Martini man" but you probably dont know what i'm talking about when I say "any time any place anywhere"...? Don't worry about it, he's a tackle tart who puts himself around a bit

I would suggest sticking with what you like, find some friends who are of the same mindset and if you are interested, ask local clubs if they do both canal and river matches? Most have concessionary rates for young anglers too so you might save a few quid.

I wish you the very best of luck Freddie!

Whilst I'd agree your post is a good one and raises some interesting points. Here the other side of the pennines river fishing is on the increase amongst the young and old. There are far more anglers on the rivers now than there were 10 years ago.
Clearly the draw was mainly barbel, but I'm now seeing many more float anglers fishing for dace, roach and chub particularly during the summer months. Thankfully these species have increased dramatically over the last 5 years and offer consistent sport, with good bags to those that have or gain the skills to catch them.

One downside is that a lot of carpers are turning to river fishing for barbel, but some are bring the bad practices they acquired when carping. Such as having socials with ale, leaving rods in and being anything up to 50 yards away from a pair of rods fishing talking to their mate(s) in their swims. Leaving rubbish, bivving up well away from the rods on top of the bank, on land that isn't covered in the lease and/or club ownership, causing conflict between clubs and the landowners and so on.

None of the above practices are acceptable to me or the clubs on rivers.

A well put together observation of the modern angling scene.

In my area, North Notts, South Yorks and North Lincs, like the bad one says, river fishing in this area is on the up. My local canals are producing the most wonderful catches, as is the Trent. Even the Idle is showing a recovery.

One of the problems is the magazines. They constantly depict anglers sitting by commercials weighed down with vast amounts of tackle, pulling out carp after carp after carp. Young anglers think they have to fish this way and look like this if they have any hope of catching anything.

And many certainly can't afford the 5 or 6 pound day ticket, or the amount of bait recommended.

Let's have features showing anglers catching fish on the simplest of gear, together with a loaf of bread for bait. When I was a youngster, I used to get on my bike with my rod and landing net strapped to the crossbar and the rest of my tackle and bait in my pockets.

And I caught lots and lots of fish.

I went to places many anglers today never see, even with their fancy cars.

Bring back this sort of "adventure fishing" to the anglers of today and watch the number of youngsters the sport will attract.

The problem is that the portrayal of this type of fishing will not result in vastly increased tackle and bait sales.