Amodoro

Their burrowing activities have been blamed for increased turbidity in some of my local rivers, also causing increased bank erosion. They eat the eggs and fry of native fish causing a reduction in recruitment and leading to fewer, but bigger fish. They do provide a food source for chub, perch, barbel, trout etc. but in my experience only the smaller ones (thumb-sized) are taken. They are very easy to catch (a piece of bacon on a string is enough) but you need loads to make a meal as each one yields very little meat due to their having relatively small tails compared to other crayfish. There's more meat in the claws.

How much are they asking for postage?

No, they only ever had stripes.

'Mepps' is an acronym and a brand name, it stands for Manufacturier d'Engins de Precision pour Peche Sportives - in English, Precision Equipment for Sport Fishing. It's not a plural, so one Mepps spinner is still Mepps with an 's'. It's also not a generic name for that type of lure. Sorry, rant over, and yes I'm a pedant!

Closest tackle shops are States Tackle, Witney or Fat Phil's, Abingdon Road, Oxford. They'll give you all the info you need and can sell you a permit.

'Osamas in pyjamas' is the best line I've ever read on here!

W4 NKR anybody? Or 6UL DV8 if you're on the other side of the pond.

What lure are you using?

I was going to have some tasty Aldi beefburgers, but I just looked in the fridge and - they're off!

I'm no expert, but a torn open fish carcass like that with just the soft organs eaten is more likely the result of predation by mink.

In my innocence I thought 'the right to bare arms' was about wearing T-shirts :unsure:

About 150,000 people die worldwide every day, so for those people at least, the world did end today

You can't fault the Americans for balance - four years ago they elected a half-black President, this time they've chosen a half-white one. . . .

Just eaten, thanks.

Because they can.

Yellow snow warning from the BBC..................... Has the dog been peeing on it again?

"Zander, a cross between a pike and a perch" ! Good to see such thoroughly researched journalism!

I've got a Normark Gold Medallion spinning rod which has served me well for years. Used to be 9ft but due to a series of unfortunate events it's now closer to 8ft. Worth anything? 99p + P&P at least?

I live quite close to Farmoor so I was able to have a wander up to the intake area on Sunday and see for myself what was going on. The river immediately adjacent to the intake grill was teeming with fry, and I saw kingfishers and grebes fishing nearby, so to my mind the pollution incident (if that's what it was) was short-lived and localised. Posts on the Farmoor flyfisher's forum suggest that a) there were nowhere near 10,000 dead fish, and they were mostly very small.

I don't fish for tench myself, but I know of two small lakes that are reputed to have good stocks: Bullfield Lake, Radley, available on the Oxford & Abingdon Alliance permit (£30/season) and Duke's lake, near Duke's Lock on the Oxford Canal (North Oxford AS, £20/season). Any help? Cheaper than day tickets at any rate!

My best fish - for me that means most memorable - was a 44 in. pike on a Mepps Lusox, from a tiny stream where I'd never caught anything over 10 lbs before. I didn't weigh it (no balance, no camera!), only estimated the length from the overlap on my 42 in. landing net. I was trembling after I landed it, and had to stop fishing cos I knew I couldn't top it.

In continental Europe the tendency is to have species-specific closed seasons to protect pressured species such as pike and zander during spawning.

If you read the byelaws for Thames Region on the EA website carefully, there's nothing stopping you fishing for trout during the coarse close season with fly or lure (including spinners). Granted the trout season doesn't open until 1st April so there's no excuse for being on the river now. Although I have to say that in 30 years of fishing the Thames with lures I've caught only a handful of trout.

Nur fuer Dich, Patrizia: ab 15. Maerz beginnt eine Schonzeit fuer "coarse fish" das heisst alle Suesswasserfische ausser Salmoniden und Aalen. Diese gilt fuer alle Fluesse und manche Seen. Geangelt darf nur in kuenstlichen Gewaessern z. B. Kiesgruben und Schiffskanaelen. Erst am glohreichen 16. Juni duerfen wir arme Englaender wieder an die Fluesse! Deshalb das ganze Gerede von "the end of the season". Hoffentlich stoert Dich mein armseliges Deutsch nicht allzuviel!