Nigel Williams

[teejay]

The only thing Nige Williams has done which many other pike anglers haven't done is to get caught.

 

Well, that's interesting! Would these be the same pike anglers who were wringing their hands a couple of weeks ago because Bob Nudd suggested that there may be too many pike in some rivers. If so, they're a bunch of hypocrites..

 

Throw Williams to the lions! He deserves it! The cult of the celebrity angler sickens me to be honest.

[Waveney One]

ColinW. I have just agreed with every word you said on another thread. I just cannot understand how you can post what you did on this. Just step back and have a long hard think about it and then think again.

 

Fishing isn't just about catching as you said in the other post. If you want to fish livebaits and can't catch them, then hard luck. There is always tomorrow, next week or even next year.

[Bob Bradford]

I agree with a lot of what you have written Waveney One (Richard) especially about the mans intelligence, in fact after reading the interview in todays Angling Times I remarked to my Son the very same thing!

 

Williams thinks ,even now, that he broke some rules, he states just that in the interview ......the truth is he BROKE THE LAW OF THIS LAND and was prepared to break the law in a foreign Country too.....all this just to catch some bloody Pike to feed his ego....the guy is as thick as **** and deserves everything that comes his way, my view of him has changed,last week I stated he at least deserved some credit for holding his hands up and pleading guilty, I do not hold that view now....how can I when he thinks he has broken "some rules" and "made the biggest mistake of his life"? Masterline must be hard up for angling consultants and the Anglers Mail must be bankrupt of good angling contributors for their weekly paper ....shame on them for standing by the idiot.

[ColinW]

I didn't say I approve of what he did. That doesn't mean I can't see why he ended up doing it. To use the speeding analogy again, I don't have to approve of a delivery driver breaking the speed limit continually to understand why one might do it, given the choice between that and getting the sack. The problem is, as others have said, that once you HAVE to get results (or lose sponsorship, writing contracts etc) then you have to start making a whole different set of decisions to those of us who are free to do whatever we like.

I suspect there are very few people at the "top" of the specimen hunting ladder who are as squeaky clean as they would like us to believe. I know of at least one person who has been photographed (and published) holding someone else's fish!

 

Having just read Bob's post above, let's all keep in mind that speeding is also BREAKING THE LAW OF THE LAND as he eloquently puts it.

Edited November 21, 2006 by ColinW

[Peter M]

The fact that Nigel Williams does not seem to understand the serious nature of the offence and is still trying to explain it away is farcical and shows the lack of integrity of the man. On the other hand I am sure that there are anglers doing similar stupid things regarding rules that are there to protect the environment and if caught then the book should be thrown at them. Anglers mail need to think very long and hard at why they allow him to continue writing for them.

[BoozleBear]

I didn't say I approve of what he did. That doesn't mean I can't see why he ended up doing it. To use the speeding analogy again, I don't have to approve of a delivery driver breaking the speed limit continually to understand why one might do it, given the choice between that and getting the sack. The problem is, as others have said, that once you HAVE to get results (or lose sponsorship, writing contracts etc) then you have to start making a whole different set of decisions to those of us who are free to do whatever we like.

I suspect there are very few people at the "top" of the specimen hunting ladder who are as squeaky clean as they would like us to believe. I know of at least one person who has been photographed (and published) holding someone else's fish!

 

Having just read Bob's post above, let's all keep in mind that speeding is also BREAKING THE LAW OF THE LAND as he eloquently puts it.

 

I understand when you say you can see why he ended up doing it, but the bottom line is he shouldn't have.

 

His actions were stupid and his words afterwards even more so.

 

I think the speeding analogy is quite different. It's a bit like jaywalking being illegal but safe to do at times. Theft on the other hand is a different kettle of fish. You would be upset for a delivery man if he got the sack for speeding whilst getting an item to you, but if he stole it, you'd be pleased.

 

I don't know ANY pike anglers that break the rules and to infer that lots of them do puts angling in a bad light and sounds like an over the top generalisation to me.

 

Waters have rules for reasons. If people don't like them they can fish somewhere else. Simple as that.

 

It's ironic that the EA have baton and CB radio supported teams nicking the illegals for taking fish, but Nige Williams gets a slap on the wrist, and probably a nice interview fee from Anglers Mail.

 

Williams should have his license taken away from him.

 

Simon

[Bob Bradford]

Rules are the following examples;

 

Using barbed hooks on a Barbless water.

 

Wading ,when club rules say it is not allowed.

 

Using 4 rods on a club water that only allows 2 etc....those are "rules" and are not breaking the LAW of the land...the difference is huge IMO but apparently not for others like Williams and Banks.

[terry t shirt]

Well if he wasnt famous before he is atleast infamous now. btw does anyone from the angling press read these boards?might be an idea to point them in this direction and let them know the views of people considering there actions on this and other matters that crop up from time to time.

[greg long]

Greg, which species of coarse fish are indigenous to ireland, only every post i read seems to inply that only trout & salmon were ever fished for. If coarse fish were introduced in the 1800s you can hardly blame pikers, as i imagine anyone rich enough to go to ireland to fish & take his bait would be fishing for the salmon probably as a guest of the local landowner.

 

Firstly I did not blame 'Pikers'......and in the 1800's salmon were very common, in fact many indentured workers had it written that they could not be fed on Salmon more than 3 days a week.

 

WE do not have Grayling, Zander, Barbel, bleak or ruffe.

Most coarse fish are Bream, Rudd & Hybrids, Tench, Perch, Eel, Pike, some Carp, some roach and dace and recently Chub.

Edited November 21, 2006 by greg long

[greg long]

One or two points in response to the Greg Long post.

The River Inny is not overrun with Chub - the Shannon Regional Fisheries board have electro fished the relevant stretches and found small numbers of chub, all of which they killed. (These are the same people who are supposed to be enforcing the new laws aimed at protecting coarse fish stocks.)

The River Inny has always been a coarse river. What numbers of trout are in the river are so negligible as to be almost irrelevant.

Chub and trout live side by side in hundreds of rivers throughout England and Wales, why do you think that it will be different in Ireland.

If Irish trout anglers hadn't been killing every fish that they caught for the last fifty years then trout stocks might be in a better position.

Every year on Lough Corrib thousands of trout are killed in competitions, yet the blame for falling stocks is laid on Roach and Bream.

Dace and Roach were introduced into the River Blackwater in the mid - 1800s. At that time it was a prolific Pike water, and was up until the 1960s, when the Fisheries Board started the systematic slaughter of pike in the river. Local people in Fermoy well remember the large quantities removed, "truckloads" as one resident told me only last year.

This Irish angling hierarchy of Salmon and Brown Trout being the only fish worth catching (and killing - to hell with the stocks), with everything else only worthy of being thrown up the bank is pathetic in this day and age. a pitiful legacy of our colonial past.

 

I would like to know where your information comes from.....Mine is direct from the fishery board, and if you read the reports from the board you will see differently. The Inny although holding some coarse fish is not a coarse fishery, it is predominantly a trout fishery and is still listed as such if you check your facts.

 

 

The 'blame' for falling stocks on Lough corrib is actually put forward as silting of feeder streams and rivers. Work has been carried out to remedy this. As for the numbers of fish killed on the Lake, it is 32 miles long and can survive a certain percentage of cropping. Studies have shown most trout only live about 5 years, so the loss of 4 and 5 yo fish does not do much damage to overall stocks.

 

 

The Irish 'hierarchy' protects our coarse fisheries. We have introduced laws to protect them. The no-livebaiting law is one of them.See this topic.

 

Finally insulting those that fish for trout and salmon does coarse angling no favours, many game anglers fish catch and release. I killed a total of 2 fish last year about 0.25%, of my catch. I also release the 3 salmon I caught. I have killed no coarse fish in 5 years...not even for dead-baits. Can you say the same?