Gratuitous Fish pics

[Riggers]

My son and I went fishing Tuesday afternoon:



Here's my big catch:



And my son's:

[Eccentrica Gallumbits]

[Regulator]

....And my son's:

[Leslei Philips] Well hello... [/Leslie Philips]

[Wowbagger]

That looks rather like a good old-fashioned wild carp, Riggers. Where was it caught?

[Riggers]

In a stream north of Lewes; one that hasn't been snapped up by angling clubs, as it's not privately owned and too piddle-arse to be considered I suspect. Anyway, we thought there might be something 'bigger' in this stretch years ago. Last time we were here, the lad was about 12, and we spent an afternoon catching minnows, who were ravenous – in goes the line – "Plop!" … "Bite!"

We did find a fair-sized lake nearby, but sadly that was surrounded by impenetrable trees and brambles to get close, though we did spy 3 herons and lots of ducks which must indicate some lovely fish are in there somewhere.

Tuesday was warm and sunny. Glorious weather for September.

[numbnuts]

One I caught earlier (well a few years ago)




Many years ago



Many many years ago

[Wowbagger]

Yours are bigger than mine, Numbnuts. The carp and the pike are pretty impressive 25lb  &20 respectively?

[Riggers]

Very impressive Nummers. You'd certainly have known you'd caught a 'big 'un' on any of those three. Difficult to gauge, but I wonder what age those fish were?

[Wowbagger]

Apparently you can tell the age of a fich in the same way as you tell the age of a tree - by counting the rings on its gill cover!

I was really into pike fishing many moons ago although I never caught a "20". I read somewhere that the grown rate depends upon whether the lake they live in is eutrophic or oligotrophic, the former having high levels of dissolved salts and the latter low. Irish loughs tend to have high levels of calcium in the water so are eutrophic. Fish in such lakes can grow to 40lb in 7 years or so. By contrast, ISTR that the biggest pike ever caught in Windermere was about 15 years old. I don't think a 40lb fish has ever been recorded there.

http://www.pikeangler.co.uk/pike-talk/ shows a list of big pike recorded in the angling press. It seems that Chew Valley Lake is about the best pike fishery in England at the moment.

[Riggers]

Fishing in Bude canal last week, a friend and I bagged a couple of whoppers! We could have used a colander for a landing net. Rudd and Bream I believe? Naturally, some chap further down the canal had earlier caught a 20lb Carp, so we were giddy with excitement at the prospect of the same for us. Apart form these two, we caught some weed.

[Hot Flatus]

[CAMRAMan]

Dick

[Hot Flatus]