luckyjim

My parents get loads of these in their compost heaps in their house in Devon. Apparently they love compost heaps because - quite apart from all the food - the heat released by the decomposition of the compost makes them nice and warm. As cold blooded creatures thats a big help, they often overwinter in them as well. You need to be careful if you accidentally disturb them as they will shed their tail as a defence against predation (the tail distracts predators while the slow worm escapes) but this will take a while to grow back, and it will have to expend energy on this and will be more vulnerable in the meantime.

This is a plea from the Thames Anglers' Conservancy to object to a scheme at Teddington Weir that has the potential to damage the whole Thames ecosystem. For those who don't fish the Thames, hydropower schemes are also being planned on a river near you. Please take 3 minutes to object and make developers think more carefully about threatening the angling on rivers across the UK. As you may be aware, Ham Hydro, a recently formed organisation, has proposed to install large hydropower turbines on Teddington Weir. The TAC and Angling Trust have strong environmental and ecological concerns about the scheme, which has the potential to damage fish spawning habitats and severely restrict fish migration. The scheme has the potential to harm anglers the length of the River Thames. The Ham Hydro planning application for Teddington Weir is under consideration at Richmond Council and they are still accepting representations. Please write to them to express your objection to the project. You may use the text below if you like, or adapt it if you prefer. Ham Hydro are mobilising large numbers of people to write in support so it is vital that we balance this with as many objections as possible. You don't have to live in the local area to make an objection. You have a legal right to comment on any planning application! The easiest is to submit an objection is directly on the planning website, visit this web address: http://idoxwam.richmond.gov.uk/WAM/...=11/3908/FUL (London Borough of Richmond upon Thames Planning case file 11/3908/FUL) Press the "Comment" button and complete the form. NB. You do not need to fill in the boxes with your email address and telephone number, if you do they will be published on the web site! Alternatively you can post a printed or written letter to: Mr. Derek Tanner London Borough of Richmond upon Thames Civic Centre 44 York Street Twickenham Middlesex TW1 3BZ You MUST include all of the information below. ================================================= From: {Your full name} Address: {Your full postal address and postcode} Planning application: 11/3908/FUL ================================================= Dear Sirs, I strongly object to the application to install hydro-electric turbines on Teddington Weir. The application is insufficiently detailed and makes far too many assumptions, leaving a number of aspects of the design open to the whim of the developer. 1) Environmental Impact Assessment - The study accompanying the application is poor, sweeping statements are made about fish habitats which show a clear lack of understanding of the subject matter. Without a full study of the weir pool habitat in advance of the development, no-one will ever know what the true environmental impact has been. 2) Noise - Very little has been made of the whining noise from the gearboxes and generators themselves, on a river this is likely to carry a long distance. Nearby business and residents will be badly affected. 3) Power generation claims - It is well known that the flow down the Thames has shown a marked decrease in recent years due to upstream abstraction for water supply. Assumptions based on historic river flow data are therefore invalid and the amount of power generated will fall woefully short of the claimed figures. The only beneficiaries of the scheme will be the plant manufacturer and the installation contractor, local investors are likely to lose all of their money. "Green" technology is a fashionable place where many people feel they would like to be making a contribution in the current climate. This must not be at a hidden cost to the environment. The Environment Agency have a conflict of interest as they are landlord, sponsor and regulator of this project. They originally promised that no more of these developments on the Thames would go ahead until the installation at Romney was operational and its effects had been studied. Please help them to keep that promise. I urge you to reject this poor quality ill-conceived application. Yours faithfully, {your name} =================================================

Says the Daily Telegraph: http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/uknews/588...-fishermen.html TV star Griff Rhys Jones has angered anglers after encouraging canoeists and boaters to "disturb as many fishermen as possible" on their travels. Rhys Jones has just finished filming a BBC documentary in which he rediscovered the country's forgotten rivers by travelling along them in a canoe. The 55-year-old has been vocal in his criticism of anglers who he claims have too much say and control over British rivers and wants water users to exact some revenge by spoiling their chance of a catch.... ...Rhys Jones said after his year canoeing, swimming and surfing along British waterways, he had discovered the rivers 'no longer belong to the people' but had been hijacked by stockbrokers, anglers and farmer. "Private fishing clubs have bought up the banks, controlling the water to the middle where they meet rival fishing clubs," he complained. "You cannot pass without permission. Our dislocation from our watery heritage has happened so slowly that no one has really noticed." ...

Unfortunately they intend nothing of the sort. Quasi-governmental organisations like the EA are required by law to consult when proposing major policy changes or legislation. For example, the Post Office had to consult when they shut each post office in the recent closure programme across the country. Since almost everyone uses post offices they couldn't really get away with hiding the consultations away, so they just ignored the consultation responses (for the most part) and closed the branches they wanted anyway. Bodies like the EA have more disparate and marginal "stakeholders" so can get away with burying decisions (and consultations on those decisions) that will affect a large number of them more easily, as with this case. They certainly aren't going to spend money on informing the people they are supposed to be serving about decisions that might be viewed negatively. This consultation probably breaches more than half of the guidelines issued by the Government in its code of practice (to which the EA is supposedly subject - you can view them here: http://www.berr.gov.uk/whatwedo/bre/consul...page44420.html). In reality, of course, nobody can actually do anything about this because bodies like the EA are almost completely unaccountable to those they are supposed to represent and serve. Just another bunch of overpaid officials in suits, who force you to pay money to tell you what you aren't allowed to do anymore. All this legislation will achieve, when it is inevitably introduced, is criminalise more perfectly decent people at the expense of the taxpayer (and the license payer)

Just came across this consultation in the course of my work (non-angling related). I thought I'd have a quick read through as interested in the eel issue, when I came across the actual proposals tucked away at the end and quite frankly I am absolutely appalled. A debate on sustainability of fish in public fisheries and on current rules/enforcement of rule is desirable and welcome. However, hiding away a wide ranging and important policy under the cover of an inoffensive (some might say obscure) consultation on specific fisheries policies is quite despicable and indicative of the attitude of officals at such quangos - and from what I've seen of them the EA in particular. The press release insinuates that this is some kind of emergency positive conservation policy to be introduced for two specific species, which I expect less than 1% of anglers would object to. The reality is the EA wants to grab legal jurisdiction under-the-radar to be able to dictate policy on taking any fish from public waterways. I don't even eat coarse fish but I am quite lost for words at the arrogance, dishonesty, and anti-democratic taste left in my mouth here. There seems to be EA officials who hang around here. Could you please explain eaxctly what is going on here.

Apologies - I just noticed that there is already a thread on this on the coarse fishing forum - admin feel free to take it down if you wish

(Note: I know there is a topic linking to this consultation already open. However, the title is bland and the attached press release appears to be disingenuous - putting it politely) Hello all, Just came across this consultation in the course of work (not angling related) just published by the EA. The press release and introductions suggest that the consultation relates to proposals limited to banning anglers taking home eels and shad for the table. However, having read through to the end, what they are actually proposing is introducing new byelaws that would allow the EA to ban anglers taking any species of coarse fish from rivers, streams and drains. They also make their preference to ban the taking of all coarse fish from all fisheries pretty clear (although admit that this is an "unrealistic" aim). From the consultation (my bold): http://www.environment-agency.gov.uk/stati...g_logo)_(3).pdf There seem to be several EA officials around here (is there an official relationship between the Agency and this site, out of interest?). Would somebody please confirm that the above is what the EA are proposing? If so, why are they trying to bury it in a consultation that is ostensibly about banning anglers taking eels and shad, which I imagine pretty much nobody disagrees with?

In a small park nestled beneath the concrete towers of the Barbican in London, a modest memorial bears the names of dozens of ordinary people who died while rescuing others from mortal danger. For the first time in nearly 80 years, a new name was yesterday added to the Watts Memorial to Heroic Self-Sacrifice, which has stood for more than a century as a testament to “heroism in everyday life”. At a ceremony in Postman’s Park in the heart of the City of London yesterday, a plaque was unveiled to 30-year-old Leigh Pitt, who died in June 2007 while saving a boy from drowning in a canal. http://entertainment.timesonline.co.uk/tol...icle6481318.ece Eight decades after the last name was inscribed in 1931, Mr Pitt’s story has been added to stand alongside the heroic deeds of 53 others who lost their lives to save another. Mr Pitt, a printworker from Surrey, died after jumping into the canal at Thamesmead, in southeast London, to save the nine-year-old boy. Mr Pitt, who was there fishing, managed to keep Harley Bagnall-Taylor above water while passers-by threw a hosepipe to the child, but Mr Pitt was unable to stay afloat or find a hand-hold in the high-sided canal walls, and drowned before he himself could be saved. His colleagues and his fiancée, Hema Shah, have been campaigning for a memorial to Mr Pitt’s sacrifice, and approached the Diocese of London to suggest updating the Watts Memorial in the churchyard at St Botolph’s without Aldersgate. Ms Shah, 38, who had been with Mr Pitt for six years, said: “It is a huge honour. In my eyes Leigh will always be a hero, but this is an opportunity for people to become aware of his actions, too. “He would have never questioned the decision he made that day. He saw a child in need and he would never have lived with himself if had he not done something — that is the sort of person he was.” Accompanied by the Lady Mayoress of London, a small crowd gathered yesterday in Postman’s Park, named after the postmen who worked at the former post office headquarters nearby, to see the hand-painted plaque unveiled at the memorial. George Frederic Watts, one of the foremost painters of his day, wrote to The Times in 1887 to suggest commemorating Queen Victoria’s Golden Jubilee by creating a memorial as a “record of the stories of heroism in everyday life”. Watts wrote: “It must surely be a matter of regret when names worthy to be remembered and stories stimulating and instructive are allowed to be forgotten.” He explained that a memorial to these “likely to be forgotten heroes” would make London “richer by a work that is beautiful, and our nation richer by a record that is infinitely honourable”. Over the next decade Watts collected newspaper cuttings and obituaries of those who had died while saving others from harm, and tiles were made by William de Morgan, and later Royal Doulton, bearing their names and tragic stories. In 1900 the Lord Mayor of London opened the “gallery” to the public. One name commemorated is that of Alice Ayres, a young servant in The Borough who died while saving three of her master’s children from a burning building in 1885. She threw the children to safety from an upstairs window but, overcome by fumes, missed the mattress as she jumped from the blazing window and fell to her death. Miss Ayres’s story became the inspiration for Natalie Portman’s character in the film of Patrick Marber’s play Closer, when she steals Alice Ayres’s identity as her own from the plaque in Postman’s Park. After Watts’s death in 1904 the practice of adding new plaques was largely discontinued and stopped completely after 1931. PC Edward Greenoff was one of the last names to be added to the gallery, after he was caught in the great Silvertown explosion while rescuing people trapped in a burning TNT factory in 1917. His granddaughter, Barbara Hird, 73, discovered his plaque in the 1950s. She said: “Adding new names is a good idea. There’s plenty of room. The military have their own memorials to brave deeds, and the police, too, sometimes, but ordinary civilians are often forgotten in the mists of time.” Mr Pitt’s fiancée hopes that his story will also be an inspiration to others. Ms Shah said: “Leigh showed strength of human courage and he thought of another before himself. Sometimes it is easier for people to turn a blind eye and I would hope Leigh’s actions would inspire someone to help another.” A spokesman for the Diocese of London said: “Watts created the memorial to pay tribute to unsung heroes and it is appropriate that Mr Pitt should be commemorated in this way. The Diocese welcomes the renewed interest in this important part of London’s heritage. “We would consider applications for further commemorative plaques, on individual merit, for acts of remarkable heroism.”

I wrote my masters thesis on the commercial whaling industry, and the attitude shown here is scarily reminiscent of commercial lobbying at the peak of the industry, when the decline in numbers of the great whale species first became obvious (the early 1960s). The industry constantly cited scientific uncertainty to justify continued overexploitation, saying that nobody knew enough about whales' breeding habits, replacement rates, and migration patterns to warrant a curtailment of quotas or a temporary cessation of whaling to allow recovery. All this despite desperate entreaties from scientists to brake exploitation of the resource until further data became available. As I'm sure most of you are aware, by the mid-1960s whale populations had experienced a catastrophic decline, from which they are nowhere near recovery, even after a 25 year moratorium on commercial whaling. We ignore what scientific data we do have at our peril.

The Norwegian Coastguard has released video of the British trawler "The Prolific" (the irony ) dumping tonnes of endangered fish into British waters. View the video here: http://www.guardian.co.uk/environment/vide...rawler.prolific From the comments I have read from British commercial fishermen, I was under the impression it was only the French and Spanish who were callously plundering our marine resources...

Its a pretty exciting swim that I usually fish, although I have to admit I had no idea that they got that big in the Thames either. I've had abouthalf a dozen though around the 4-6 pound mark. Thing is I've never deliberately targeted them, actually catch them whilst live-baiting for perch with small dace livebaits during daylight hours. My brothers one was on a hot day with bright sunshine, around 2pm. You get pike and eels occasionally as well. My favourite though is catching 2 inch juvenile bass when trying to catch the dace for bait!

It was 14lb and 2-4oz (I was standing up in the boat and wobbling a bit so I couldn't get the oz exactly) I checked the EA site and can't find a list anywhere, but it was a cracking fish to catch and went back unharmed to fight another day so thats enough for us!

Hi all, Does anybody know where I can find the record weights for fish species caught in the Thames? I ask because I was chatting to a bloke on the bank who seemed in the know today and when I mentioned the weight of a zander my brother caught last month suggested that it might be a Thames record. Unfortunately when he caught it we were out in a little inflatable boat and wanted to get it back in the water ASAP, so we didn't get any witnesses or anything, but it would nice to check for our own satisfaction! Thanks, Jim

As far as I'm aware, there aren't any restrictions on the fishing side of it over and above normal angling good practice. Mooring to buoys, pontoons etc can sometimes be a problem, best to speak to owners or do it discreetly. And of course you need to get a license for/register your boat (although I think its alright if its unpowered).

Wow... posts like these make me regret being so boastful about my own fortunes in my nickname! Although I'm sure luck had nothing to do with it Sounds amazing mate. I know virtually nothing about such matters, but I have a couple oy my own questions/naive suggestions: 1) Would the introduction of some kind of flow of water be beneficial? Just a strong pump at one end creating a slight flow? I would assume that would help with algae or even blanket weed and also aerate the water during summer, or force the leaves into one area where they could easily be removed. Obviously the main problem would be costs, especially energy bills. Solar power an option? Clearly pricey but maybe you could get a grant or subsidy if such things were available? 2) What effect would introducing some small eels have? A species on the decline - maybe in 25 years time they'll have grown and be worth a fortune after the species becomes extinct?