Whilst we were visiting the water to do our feature finding hopefully we chose nice sunny calm days so we had a chance to see some of the fish we hoped to catch as well. Certainly if we found areas of snags or the early signs of lily beds then we should have seen the…

IrelandTench in Ireland are perhaps more legendary than they are in England. Although Ireland still officially has to produce the amount of 10lb plus specimens that England has, without doubt they are there. The big difference with Ireland is that there are few gravel pits. The majority of tench fishing takes place in natural loughs…

A suspect case of foot and mouth disease has been found near to Chew Valley Lake and thus it cannot open on March 22nd as planned. I guess that we were all expecting this would happen – I really do think that with all the possible bad press that there could be, we should be…

The water was very cold and clear, so much more like winter, with the end of the season now visible on the horizon now was the time to put some concentrated effort in, as I knew the carp would soon start moving and would be hungry. The winter on this lake had been a poor…

This of course was no joking matter, but from a river anglers perspective it was dammed inconvenient. As portrayed very graphically by the media, floods were everywhere, but most that hit the headlines concerned areas affected by sustained floodwater over several days and more. There were of course many other floods occurring; flash flooding, where…

Nice idea! When I arrived at the lake it was higher than ever. From the gate I could see the water was far higher than when I had left just a week before. As I drove in to the back of my usual swim where the water was usually a full three feet below the…

To start with, there have been many worrying reports in the newspapers and on the radio regarding cutbacks in the water industry. The chances are that these won’t necessarily affect us directly, but I have a horrible feeling that changes will sneak up on us in covert ways. The shareholders of the big water companies…

Address: Jacklands Fish Farm Jacklands Bridge Clevedon RoadNailsea Nr BristolBS21 6SGPhone: 01275 810697Directions: From Nailsea take the B3130 towards Clevedon passing the fire station on your right. At the bottom of the hill you will see the fishery on your right. If you pass the sign for Tickenham you have gone too far. The fishery…

Had there been onlookers at such an early hour, they might have interpreted the sight of 3 rubber-suited men striding into the surf at dawn as some sort of ritualised suicide pact. As the water passed my midriff and the currents tried to wash me up the coast I wondered if such an interpretation might…

Obvious ones that are in daily use for example are herds, flocks, and shoals, but there are hundreds of names describing specific species. I was intrigued to learn that an animal which I think is of special attractiveness to most of mankind, the porpoise, and also the dolphin, have a social structure which includes similarities…