TROUT & SALMON

The voice of game-fishing since 1955

MANY OF YOU WILL ALREADY KNOW about the closure of the Midlands fisheries at Draycote, Eyebrook and Thornton reservoirs.

Around the same time, Lincolnshire’s Toft Newton fishery also closed. There is hope that alternative management can be found for these fisheries, but it is a huge blow to many anglers and a worrying time for stillwater trout fishing. It is not just anglers who are immediately affected. Spare a thought for the fishery staff. The tackle trade will suffer, too, as will the fish farms that supply thousands of trout.

Recently, we ran a piece citing the probable reasons for the demise of Toft Newton. Now that we’ve lost three more fisheries, it’s time we faced the issues that may have led to these closures.

Although we, as customers, cannot balance the books, I believe that our angling attitudes and expectations must change. The recent closures suggest to me that it is unsustainable for a fishery to cater for the rod averages and bag limits that many modern anglers now expect. On some catch-and-release waters — including the UK’s premier reservoirs — anglers brag about catching 50 trout a day. I hear boats complaining about catching only 20 fish a day.

When I started reservoir trout fishing in the early ’90s, there was an eight-fish limit. Catching this limit was a rarity, but if you were lucky enough to do so, it was cause for celebration. Having this modest limit also meant that you had to decide whether you caught your eight fish and called it a day, or whether after catching a couple of easy fish (to avoid a blank) you opted to spend the rest of the day searching for better fish on other methods. One could argue this latter approach made you a better, more rounded angler. But of course, fishing was simpler then. There was no catch-and-release.

The introduction of catch-and-release was pivotal. Anglers who didn’