Simon
At this stage in a thread 'tradition' is that we all agree to differ so here's my parting shot.
The post is about 'Unattended Rods'. Everyone here agrees that they're a bad thing. Why are they a bad thing? - because should you get a bite, a fish could hit a snag before you can exercise control over your rods - and that's bad for fish.
If you sleep while fishing you can't be in control of your rods.
You seem to have deliberately ignored my post. A "sleeping" angler can be in control of his rods in much the same time as a waking one, with no risk to fish, if he has prepared his baiting spots and set-up responsibly. There is no difference between this and a day-time angler "snoozing", in fact it's more likely that a day angler will be snag-fishing. Not all carpers are noddies, not all Specimen Anglers are that mercenary. The last thing any decent angler wants in the middle of the night is to lose a fish in a snag before he's even picked up the rod, then have to tie a new rig and re-cast with no distance marker on the line to a pre-baited spot. Fail to prepare, prepare to fail, as the saying goes.
Now somewhere along the line you have made the assumption that I'm aiming all of my 'opinion' at Carp / Specimen anglers - and I'm not,
I fish for Carp but with floats and running rigs in rivers and canals. Worse still is your delusion that I've posted words which I haven't actually posted, to construct your argument.
I refer to my accentuated quote of your previous post. Your language there and your reference above shows your preferred methods are obviously at odds with the majority of modern carpers whom you appear to me to be looking down your nose to. Your choice of language says a thousand words to me.
For instance -
To suggest that everyone bivvying up with bolt-rigs is fishing an unplumbed, unkown swim and snag-fishing with an average "wake-up" time measured in minutes, as you clearly are, I find quite reprehensible and not a little patronising toward the many responsible, capable carp/speci anglers out there. These are your words not mine - and they don't represent what I think - there are other examples in the same post, but even I'm bored.
Even the Chav Professor was driven to an emoticon with his tale of the boy in France 'catching'
(some might say trapping) a Carp whilst eating his breakfast.
Another "thousand words".......
Back to the Post - general agreement then that 'Unattended Rods' are bad. But the 'Elephant in the room' that no one likes to talk about is actually there's a lot of people who like night fishing and its different because you're not really asleep you're just dozing off - a bit.
If you haven't done it, then you haven't an opinion worthy of the name.
I predicted way back that the semantics of what constitutes "unattended rods" would be a free-for-all and I wasn't disappointed.
One or two examples of bad practice don't make for a damning indictment of the thousands of anglers who successfully fish this way.
You might as well criticise all float-fishing for leaving small hooks and light line trailing from Big Fish which are too strong for the tackle.
I hope you don't apply the same theory to driving a car.
Now that is a really pointless analogy.
Hi Noknot! Great to hear from you again.
Mark