Anderoo

March 15th, what a day! Three months to go... Still, the excitement will soon begin to grow and by June 16th it will be SO worth abstaining. Already my thoughts are turning to targets for next season. I'm going all out for a Thames carp or two, and I'm going to use the break to prebait and do loads of walking the banks. I'm also going to try to locate some Thames barbel at the same time. In a month or two I'll probably get round to sorting out and cleaning all my gear. It's in a bit of a state at the moment... Does anyone else still not fish in the old close season? What do you do with your time?

OK, last one to reply to Gozzer - not all, no, just some. Kleinboet, maybe it's because black people were discriminated against for years and the police force is not representative of society, thereby compromising it's efficiency and further polarising communities. Just a thought. Right, I'm really going now.

I'd much rather grow vegetables than debate with them. It's a shame you can't see the irony that it's ill-informed, polarised, media drip-fed attitudes like yours that are causing problems in this country. I'm out of here. As you were, gentlemen. Please continue your simplistic tirade on behalf of all the put-upon, poor, white men in the country. They need your support.

Cheers Peter. I'm glad I'm not alone. I joined this forum because it seemed like the best - the Coarse and Carp forums are good, and I really enjoy contributing to them. It's a concern to see the true colours of some posters (if you'll excuse the pun). It's 2006, I really thought we were past all this. EDIT: Chesters, a new boy yes, but I've been reading the boards for years. I base my opinions on facts and the clearly stated opinions of others.

My point is that I didn't realise how stupid the UK angling community is. At the moment I am ashamed to be part of it. What education and life experiences have you people had to come to such red-top conclusions? A rhetorical question, I'm not interested in your replies. For any lurkers out there, we're not all this dense.

Wow. I'm bored silly so I think, let's see what my fellow anglers get up to on the non-fishing forum. I don't think I've ever read such a pile of ignorant, uninformed, sensationalist crap in my life. I am actually embarassed on your behalf. Poor you, having to live in such an oppressive country,and having to put up with being white, male and straight as well. It's a wonder you cope. May I respectfully suggest you stop reading whichever 'newspaper' you currently scan, and take a second to consider the wider implication of issues. I can't be bothered to go on, it's clearly pointless - go ahead, waste your vote on fascists. It's such a shame this is clearly the dominant opinion in fishing circles. Either that or no-one else wants to stand up to you. If this is a sign of the collective angling mentality in the UK now, we're in trouble. I hope you realise how thick you sound. No-one outside angling will take us seriously or give us any respect if this is the tone we take, and quite rightly. You sound like simpletons. Duuurrrrrr.

Great stuff

As with everything, it depends on circumstances and to a large extent on what gives you confidence. Stiff hooklengths (mono, coated braids, flourocarbon) are good for distance fishing as they won't tangle, and some would say they're effective because a hook on a stiff hooklength is difficult to eject. Soft hooklengths (braids usually) allow the bait to behave more naturally and give it more freedom to be sucked up. Combi-links are supposed to have the benefits of both. All these hooklength materials = big business and the massive choice combined with perpetual magazine coverage serves to confuse and disorientate people into using the latest wonder material, and seduce them into the latest fad. I'm a big old cynic, as you've no doubt guessed ( ) and I reckon if you choose your swim well, feed it effectively, stay quiet and choose an effective bait, hooklength material is, ahem, largely immaterial. When carping I usually use either Merlin (soft braid) or mono/fluorocarbon (stiffish). I've tried a lot of different materials over the years and I've come to the conclusion that they're just designed to extract pounds from pockets - none of them will improve your angling.

Fantastic fish, legitimate method (which, incidentally, proves it's not a fluke capture) and ignore all the petty sniping - congratulations

Hi Steven I think this is a fancy name for fishing an open-ended feeder containing small pellets plugged with pellet-based groundbait, the hookbait being a pellet on a band. That's probably about all there is to it. The flow of the river causes the pellets to 'explode' from the feeder. I suppose you'd have the feeder on a short link. I've never used it, so I expect someone else can offer better advice!

I'm not really sure who comes off worse here - the article manages to make everyone look pretty poor. Interesting that it made national news though. Although I kind of wish it hadn't...

Nice apology! It's pretty poor again after a glimmer of hope. We seem to have Sweden's weather with England's women. A pretty depressing combination.

Well, my final trip of the year was indeed a fizz instead of a bang - we fished from Friday afternoon to lunchtime on Sunday for a 2lb carp between us! We tried every method and every bait and moved a couple of times, but it was dead. Freezing cold too. I reckon by tomorrow night I'll be breathing a sigh of relief and doing my best to forget probably the worst season I've ever had. Well done to those who caught!

I love the Wissey, still my favourite river even though I now live a couple of hundred miles away. The drains have been fishing pretty poorly accourding to a mate who's been on them all winter, so I'd go for the wissey and get some pike and at dusk some lovely fat roach. Well, I'm off in an hour or so for my final proper trip of the season. The weather's looking good (for the fish, that is) and I'm itching to get going - wish me luck...! And good luck everyone else too, I hope you make the most of it (this excludes anyone who fishes through the close season, obviously Does June 16th mean nothing to you people? ). (Remember to check behind the bushes for immigrants. If you let this problem get out of hand you'll wake up in the morning and find they've eaten your bivvie, and taken your job. All on benefits too. It makes me want to puke my guts out. )

If they're banned where you fish, you can't use them. If you have a choice and you'd prefer barbless, use barbless. Ditto barbed. Problem solved! I use both, as situations dictate. On balance, more barbless than barbed. Some people say barbless cause more damage as the hook moves and tears during the fight (I've never found this) and some say barbed cause more damage as the barb tears when removing the hook (I don't find this either). As I said on a previous thread, I think it's more to do with unbalanced tackle, especially high tc rods and heavy leads, than the hook itself. If one or the other types of hook consistently caused mouth damage, it would be very obvious to everyone, and there would be no debate over it. If your tackle is balanced and you're not a bully, and you are competent at unhooking, there's no reason to use either only barbed or barbless.

I'd agree with Poledark - setting your rods up fresh each trip will encourage you to think a bit more about what tactics and rigs to use for the conditions that session. Say you're set up already with the standard tubing, lead-clip, semi-fixed rig and you arrive to find nice fat carp bubbling away in the margins, you may be tempted to drop that in because it's already set up. Setting up fresh you'd no doubt use different tactics. However, if you're confident that you know exactly what you're going to do, the simple answer is you can leave rods made up as long as you want to. Check the line and hook before you cast out to be safe. A compromise could be to leave one or two rods made up (depending on how many you usually use) and leave one to make up on the bank.

Nice one. What were the successful tactics?

I fish a silty estate lake and all I use is either green Merlin or good old mono (depending on whether I want a stiff or supple hooklength). I've caught well on both. Try some mono in the margins and see how you feel - it's largely unused these days but still does the business.

Hi Jabber. I'm in Oxfordshire, so no good, but hopefully someone will be local and fancy a session.

Well, another season's nearly over and there's just one weekend left to make sure you go out with a bang - or maybe a fizz. What's everyone up to? The weather looks to be getting better this week - south-westerlies, rain and higher temps - and then gets colder again by the weekend (with snow on Sunday ). I'm meeting up with an old friend and going to a shallow gravel pit for carp, bream and tench (hopefully), and he's going all out for catfish (no chance in my opinion!). I just hope the lake doesn't freeze and that I don't freeze to death during the night. Then a couple of after-work chubbing trips on Monday and Tuesday, and that's that - time to dust off the trout gear and hope I can remember how to cast a fly!

Good question Jamie! I remember catching my first big carp like it was yesterday - I can still feel the buzz all these years later. My pb was 3.5lb for about 6 years, and I had no ambition to better it. One summer's morning I was fishing with a friend at a lovely old clay pit in Norfolk. It was very deep and very clear, with lots of weed growth and lillies in the margin. We were float fishing for crucians and tench. About a couple of hours into the session a movement in the margin caught my eye, and I glanced down to see 3 of the biggest carp I've ever seen, mooching around under my feet. Trembling, I very slowly reeled in and hooked on a big chunk of bread from my sandwiches and removed the shot from the (4lb) line. Barely daring to breathe I lowered it into the group of fish, where it started to slowly sink. With no hesitation at all the biggest of the three carp rose up and sucked it in. I can still see that scene with absolute clarity. What followed was a cominal attempt to land the fish, with a group of anglers gathering behind me adding to the pressure. How the 4lb line and tiny hook held I'll never know, but I managed to land it after about 15 minutes of blind panic. On the scales it went 16lb, and I was on a high for months. What a day!

Yes, the EA said it wanted to attract people into fishing by stocking more fish into rivers. Does it feel like we're going round in a circle here? I think the point is that if people are to truely enjoy fishing, it shouldn't be easy to catch a fish. Especially when you're learning. When people suggest taking youngsters/beginners to carp pools or other easy waters to get them interested, I reckon you're starting them off down the wrong road. Obviously you shouldn't take a beginner to a very difficult water, but I reckon for the first dozen or so (short) trips you should expect half a dozen small fish per session. Fishing a float, of course!

A good mix of responses to this one. The reason I asked is that I honestly don't know what I would do. To me, these places (and I am thinking of the purpose-dug, overstocked pool) symolise everything that fishing is not. However, I can't imagine a life without fishing. Let's hope it doesn't happen. I think occasionally fishing them but targetting overlooked species (perch, bream, roach, sturgeon - joke ) would be the best compromise. The rest of my time could be spent online, moaning

Ha ha, I thought he did rather well!

I've had a crap pike season this year. I'm blaming the conditions! It's DEFINITELY not my fault