Kimberley – now there’s a name to conjure with. Almost exactly a hundred years ago, during the Boer war, my Grandfather was treading these parched hills at the time of the siege of Kimberley. Well I remember sitting on his aged knee to hear scary tales of how the British defenders ate rats, and hard…

Thankfully lots of birds come to my garden which make things Interesting. From the ever present sparrows and starlings, to blackbirds, thrushes,a pied wagtails, all the tits, blue, long tailed, coal and great tits, robins and wrens – all putting in an appearance during the course of a day. Many times my day is brightened…

We arrived in Montreal after finishing our meetings late Friday afternoon and transformed ourselves from city suited businessmen to fully garbed fishermen within five minutes in the men’s toilets in the airport. We were ready to tackle the mighty St Lawrence river carp.Joe Babbitt met us at the luggage carousel and soon we were in…

During the winter the carp are under 2 or 3 feet of ice – probably feeding very little. As the ice melts and the shallow bays start to warm up in advance of the main water body, the carp move in to first feed up and then to spawn. Because carp are warm water fish…

You are sitting quietly, expectantly at the back of the boat; the boat man is trolling at speeds that initially make you think it is far too fast; the echo sounder indicates rugged territory beneath you and the first of several ‘blips’ show at around 20 feet. Your heart races, surely there will be a…

Now, going by the title of this piece you might be forgiven for thinking that this is one of those ‘travel’ pieces. Well. It’s not. It’s actually about how I managed to catch some fish that weren’t feeding. Read between the lines and you might pick up a tip or two – or you might…

History : The Dream Lakes complex consists of five well established ex – gravel pits, which were dug out and have been allowed to mature naturally after filling. The more well known Dream Lakes 1 & 2 need no introduction and have been well documented on the fantastic results that have been achieved on them,…

It all stated around Christmas, I had a phone call from Geoff. “We’re going back out to the Ebro in May, do you fancy it?” A short pause followed. “I can’t really afford it,” I said without thinking too much about the costs involved. When you work for the Environment Agency as I do this…

At that time, as a boy of nine, I used to spend all my summer holidays with an Aunt and Uncle on a Shropshire farm mid-way between Shrewsbury and Much Wenlock. Almost fifty years on I cannot remember why, but I was given a fishing rod and reel and made plans to begin a new…

In the past the name game fishing was given to describe the taking of trout, sea trout and salmon by fly fishing. Occasionally the term game fishing was given to those using spinning tackle. Should we have a name change?. Today many of you are not only catching the salmonoid species but also coarse and…