StuMac

Mate of mine *always* complains about this! Says local tow path is impossible to ride along. Apparently you need some sort of permit to ride on towpaths (I'm a keen cyclist but based in Scotland so don't know about down south) - well basically he's got one and is sick of arguments with anglers who obstruct the path!!! Have to sympathise. Amount of litter and junk left around popular lochs here is a disgrace.

I'm sure this is a very constructive approach to take. It is, after all, very important not to give the impression of being a raving lunatic. The inland cormorents in the UK are not sea birds. There has always been a strain of inland cormorent in mainland europe and they have decided to come here and they are definately a pest. British cormorents are still on the coast just like they've always been. It's important to realise that birds do not just up stakes and fly across the channel for no reason. They've come here 'cos there's free food to be had in the form of densly stocked fisheries in certain areas of the the South of England / midlands. Their effect is not as widespread as people think - anglers in the fens / broads are complaining that there are so many roach, bream, dace around that the pike are getting hard to catch. Charlie Bettel recons they should send cormorents his way! Probably the best way to get rid of Cormorents is to have a 10 year ban on the stocking of rainbow trout into reservoirs. Once this artficially high food source is gone, their numbers will fall. If people want to fish these sorts of waters then they'll have to accept that they are affecting the natural balence of the countryside (or what's left of it). Shoot as many as you like, scream for a cul as loud as you like - it won't make the blindest bit of difference 'cos cormorents actually compete for feeding sites. Bit like grouse compete for space on the moors - shoot ten today and, in a good year, ten more birds will fly onto the moore to be shot the next day. Same with cormorents, blow 10 birds away at your local reservoir and another 10 will come along to fill their places. The fact that there's so much food means that breeding is very succesful so there are plenty more where they came from. Smashing eggs will also have little effect, they are long lived (20 - 30 years) and so,if the population is to remain stable two birds have to hatch two chicks in this time. If you have birds on a perpetual feeding frenzie combined with very mild weather thenn breeding is a lot more succesful thyan that. You have to keep up the culling / egg smashing for decades to have any effect. Sudden increases in bird populations are not unheard of. Many cities in the NE of England had major problems with urban sea birds (Kitiwakes in particular, which most people think of as 'nice' birds) in the late 60s early 70s. They were a huge problem and nothnig anyone did seemed to have any effect. Pike anglers are always telling people, the density of prey determines the density of predators and so don't waste time and money on pike culs as they have bugger all effect. I'm affraid its the same with birds!

There's one thing you can certainly say about German style trophy hunting....... ....once it's head's been stuffed and mounted on the living room wall the circus can't go after it!!!

We were at a conference in Cambridge just before Christmas, and got "pickled in the Pickeral" a couple of times. What is the pike fishing like in Cambridge - and how can you get a permit? Some of the rivers looked really nice and if I go back in the summer I might manage a few hours lure fishing in the evening.

Old news I'm afraid! Pike are not indeginous across the whole of the N. American continent and the americans put huge amounts of time and effort into making sure that species oo not get transported outside their natural ranges. Northern pike (as they call pike in the US) have been illegally stocked into some lakes in Northern California and the fish and game people are putting a lot of time and effort into getting rid of them. However, don't for one moment think americans are anti pike. Although not as highly prized as bass, pike are regarded as a prime sportfish in the Northern states (where are an indigenous species) and, although they may get eaten on a regular basis, anyone taking under or oversized fish (they have 'slot' limits there), exceeding their catch limit or chucking a pike up the bank (it is illegal to kill a fish for any reason other than to eat it) will have the State Fish and Game people on them like a ton of bricks. In the states they set laws regulating their fisheries and enforce them with a capita 'E' by rangers who pack pistols. I wish we did the same here. The only place I've really fished in the states is in Maryland, at a big (by our standards) lake 45 mins away from Baltimore. Anyone can turn up at the boat landing, buy a licence, buy bait (yes live bait too) and fish. The seven day licence lets you fish anywhere in the state, no club membership, no waiting list to join a syndicate - nothing! Bearing in mind that the place I was fishing was very close to a huge city, the fishing was exteremely good and very well regulated. A lot better than anything we have in the UK. I'd lobve to fish some of those really wild lakes out in the paciofic North West. They may blow up pike, but I'm afriad the americans could teach us an awful lot about fishery management.

I always liked reading what Dick Walker had to say - thought he was very imaginitive and, as folk say, really up with the technical innovations. I find it strange that Bernard venables seems to ber remembered more these days. His booms just seemed to churn out the same old stuff to me. How many people here remember BV's rants about fixed spool reels and how they should be banned? I remember an article by Dick walker in which he was using fixed spool reels for light float fishing before BV had even started fishing.

Most places in the world at the same latitude as western Europe are a lot colder. Day length may be the same, but a spending a winter in Quebec or North Korea is a pretty harsh experience. New York is a lot further south than London but gets a lot colder in the winter. If talk of atlantic conveyor stopping are true, that's what it will be like here.

I've eaten a few pike this year - very nice on a BBQ with wine. People have told me there's no meat on them once they're cleaned, but that's rubbish. A 4lb fish is plenty for four people. Bones are a bit of a pain. I think that taking one to eat is the only acceptable reason for killing a fish. Mine came out of a loch that's full of pike and trout - I've take trouit home to eat so why not pike - they taste as good in my opinion? Compared with the number of jacks that get hit on the head and dumped after taking trout flies, the three that I took are a drop in the ocean!!

We are always being told that british fisheries are well managed, conservation a big issue etc. etc. I travel quite a lot to Austria and the south of Germany, and I'm constantly amazed by the sheer numbers of fish swiming around their rivers and lakes. The shoals of dace / chub in the river flowing through Tubingen are incredible. I would describve it as an anglers dream, and yet a local fisherman told me nobody fishes there 'cos the fishing's not very good in the middle of town! Don't understand!

Can I have a password too?? (and idiot proof instructions Stu

The EA certainly stopped folk doing that sort of work on their boats on beach near Arbroath for that reason.

Chucking unused bait into the water would certainly feed up the fish! It's interesting that groundbaiting is such a big part of UK fishing. I read somewhere that anglers bait accounts for a huge fraction of fish diet on some popular waters. One effect of this is that they hold unnaturally high populations of fish. We're basically fishing for domesticated animals!! Ground baiting (chumming I think they call it) is banned in most states in the US for exactly that reason - they try to maintain their fisheries in as natural a state as possible. I think you'd get prosecuted for just chucking disused bait in ove there, although it must go on.

I quite often (= almost always) troll live / dead baits 'cos I'm hyperactive and have to do something like steer a boat - can't stand sitting still! If you use an ABU (or similar) multiplier you can leave the real out of gear with the ratchet on. This holds the bait quite nicely. You can slightly tighten up the end cap if the it's giving line too easily, fish don't seem put off by resistance, but I tend to think if you have to do that you'r going too fast. I usually use the slowest possible setting on my electric outboard, and often pulse the motor on for 5 seconds, off for 10 or something similar. However, I sometimes zip along at quite a speed (setting 3/4) as some days you only seem to get bites with fast-moving baits. When a pike takes the bait the sound of the ratchet going is music to your ears! You then lift the rod out of the rest, ratchet off, control the line with your thumb whilst you work out which way the fish is going, and then strike. Brilliant way to fish, give it a go. It works really well with smelts set up on a wobbling trace with a spinner blade about 2 inches in front of the first treble. You get scent attraction of deadbait and the visual attraction of a lure. May not be too good with lures as the pike may not hang onto the bait. You can also combine it with lure fishing once you know the water, just nudge the boat along likley looking spots trolling the bait and casting a lure. Can get a bit too much once the wind gets up though.

I had pike last week. Had it once in Sweden (where you can buy them in fishmongers), but it came as part of a rice dish so didn't really tast it the flesh on its own. Always wanted to try it again so last week kept a 5 lb one and we split it open and cooked it on the BBQ. First thing that amazed me is just how much meat there is, a lot more than a 5 lb cod. Enough to feed 4 with potatoes and green beans. I've read that theres not a lot left by the time you've removed the bones but not true. Second thing was how nice it was - very firm white flesh with quite a strong taste. I enjoyed it but can see people really disliking it. There are a lot of small bones which are a bit of a pain, but no worse than a kipper!

Thought that might get PW going - just surprised how long it took!! Actually Pete, if you read the description of how I fish (float trolling with braid) my line is always taught right through to the bait and I keep it that way even after the fish has taken. I have almost no slack line in the system, and really feel in direct contact with the fish. The ratchet going is *always* the first sign of a take although I also watch the float too. Doing it my way I never deep hook fish, although I have had one or two that have almost swollowed a lure, and often miss jacks even on small baits which suggests to me that I'm doing it right! My strike (even after 10) is probably quite rapid when compared to a fish picking up a dead bait on the bottom conected to a rod in a pod via 60 odd yards of stretchy mono with a sag in it. Under those conditions I think bite detection would be pretty sluggish, despite snazzy bite indicators. Don't really know as I hardly ever fish static baits. I usually troll / cast lures from a slowly moving boat.

When I was a lad and started pike fishing my Dad told me 'count to 10 then strike'. I've always done that when live / dead baiting, never deep hooked a fish and find it very hard to hook jacks. I lost 2 fish in the 3 - 4 lb catagory on trolled smelts (4 - 5 inches long) on Sunday morning, but managed to land a 5 lb one. That'a about my average hook up rate for small pike. Worse if I use bigger baits like 8 - 9 inch trout. Fish over 8 lb almost invariably hook with no problem no matter what bait I use. When trolling (I hate fishing static baits - find it boring) I leave the rod in the rest with the multipler out of gear but the ratchet on. Although I keep an eye on the float, it's really there to control the depth the bait works at. The first indiction of a bite is *always* the ratchet. When it goes I start counting, switch the outborad off (no problems trolling under power up here) pick the rod up and flip the ratchet off. You can keep the line surprisingly tight without spooking the fish - I just lay my thumb on the spool and let the line run out under just enoughy tension to just put a *slight* bend the rod (at present I use a 7ft Harris light jerkbait rod for this style fishing - excellent length to handle in a boat). During this time I try to get an impresion of which way the fish is swimming. With braid you can feel the fish moving and guage its size, although this is often very misleading as big fish can be very gentle whereas jacks can really tug at the bait. Once I've counted to 10 I tighten into the fish - if it's a jack then I quite often loose it. Often you can reel them to the side of the boat where they spit the bait out. They weren't even hooked jus hanging on by their teeth. If its a decent size fish then the rod bends right over and I almost invariably get a good hook up and land it. If people want to strike straight away - fine, but my method never gives me any problems and I'd recomend it to anyone!

Bruno How do you recon Grayling are non indigenous?? There are plenty of them in rivers in the North East of England (Tees, Tyne, Wear), although I don't think they make it across the penines. Loads in the Tay. Who introduced them? As for pike and perch - given their global distribution, the range of habitats they occupy in Canada and Scandinavia (all the way up, running out of steam in extreme NW, but spreading through finland and into russia), the fact that they were certainly in mainland britain during stone age, and the recent geology of the N. sea basin, I find it very hard to accept that these species could not 'indigenous'(i.e. post ice age) to all river systems along the east coast (same applies to Grayling). In biological terms the penines are a much more significant barrier than the Scots border! West coast lochs (and Wales and the Lake District) may well be a different matter, I people say that pike were introduced into some lochs connected to L. Awe syetm, and one in particular did mark the Northern extent of the road from Glasgow in the 19th centuary, so it could be true.

Read this and mentally substitute the word 'pike' for Cormerant. Sound familiar? If so then you now understand why certain parts of the birdwatching community feel the ay they do about coarse fishermen.

Hedgehogs were taken to the Outer Hebrides by a gardener who thought they would control his slugs. They've found conditions much to their liking, and are destroying the eggs of land breeding sea birds. Sad 'cos I like Hedgehogs, they should never have been taken their in the first place and they really are doiong some damage now.

Don't forget day length. Even if the temperature doesn't rise, most fish will spawn eventually in tresponse to increasnig day length. I've seen pike spawning in Sweden when lakes still almost frozen, with melting ice floes all over the surface. Water must have been exteremely cold by our standards

The slot limits in Canada (Ontario) are indeed complicated! Youare allowed 6 jacks per day (limit for a longer trip) but can take 1 medium size pike instead of so many jacks, and one specimen instead of all of them. Limits change from water to water. It seems a lot to us, but here are the differences (as I see them) 1 There are very few anglers in relative terms, although some waters near places like Toronto do get a bit hammered! 2 It is illegal do do anything with the fish you catch apart from eat them. You can be prosecuted if you sell them (need a commercial licence) or just through them up the bank. 3 Certain areas are limited to catch and release only, and others are fish santuaries where all fishing is banned. The authorities (Ontario Ministry of Natural resources, OMNR) are constantly monitoring catches and re-desigbnating areas. 3. The rules are enforced (amazing eh?). OMNR set up road blocks, stop cars with fishing gear / boats and search them! You even get information about how to fillet / pack your fish to facilitate quick catch examinations. You must,. for instance, leave patches of skin on so that species can be identified. 4. You can get a 'consevration licence' whioch lets you keep two jacks a day, traditionally eaten as lunch! Intersting surveys have been done on fish populations in lakes that are frequently fished. Conclusion is that angling pressure has no effect on the overall biomass of pike, but that heavily fished waters do become 'jack' waters. Intersting that the OMNR protects some waters that are near cities by making them catch and release only, whereas others are left as 'Jack waters' - it's seen as important that theer are places where families / crowds of mates can have a nice day out and take fish for the BBQ. So Peter - how would you like that in Norfolk?? No more than six pike a day out of Hickling Broad, catch and release on the river yare and road blocks on the way backl to London?? I think the system works well in a sparcly populated county, not sure about here.

Does nobody else find Matt Hayes / John Wilson etc just totally boring? Would like to do their job, but forget about watching them!

I think what he meant was that their physical appearence was half way between a pike and a perch hence the Durch name snoekbaars (pike Perch). Which is fair enough - I don't think Matt Hayes really thinks they're hybrids!

Was thinking the motive for posting may be dubious, by which I mean it just doesn't make any sense to me at all.

This does sound dubious to me, as a PhD supervisor! Any decent fish monger would be able to get dead eels, and probably live ones too come to that. If he/she needs live eels for experiments, then they should come via proper sources of which there are several. I find it unbelievable that a student who really needs eels has to ask for them on the web! Experiments on any living vertebrate (which includes eels) can only be conducted by a person holding the appropriate licences from the home office, although you don't need a licence to experiment on bits of tissue that you've dissected out of a freshly killed eel.