Nathan
Well-known member
Below isan email i sent earlier today to a club secretary after walking along a length of their canal yesterday.My question is what could/should i have done? Who do you contact for these kind of things? I took a long walk up the canal yesterday and was a little shocked by a few things i thought i should bring to your attention; 1) there were a couple of eastern Europeans who had clearly stayed overnight fishing for pike - they were using 6 rods between them and these were spread several metres down the towpath & tied to branches to stop them going in the water if they got a bite. If they had caught a pike I would have grave concerns for its safety as it seemed they were fishing for the pot rather than for sport. 2) I saw 2 reasonably sized pike lying belly up within a metre of each other - this could be coincidence however its more likely to be as a result of poor handling on the bank and/or deep hooking.3) I also saw a dead carp of around 10-12lbs which looked like it had had chunks of flesh taken off of it's flanks. It looked to me as if someone had taken the meat off & thrown the rest of the fish back. I know when you buy your licence it enables you to take up to 2 fish home per day but what local byelaws are in place? Do you have any specific rules for your waters regarding taking fish? I wouldn't mind so much if there was no other food available but to eat a small bit of a carp that could be 30 years old just to throw the rest of it back into the water is beyond me.As you can probably tell im an angler and i love fishing so i'll try to protectmy sportin anyway i can. If this happens again who should i contact in the first instance?