NAVIGATING THE THORNY ISSUE OF MATCH FISHING ‘RULES’...
I’M LUCKY enough to run a couple of fisheries. Birchwood is a carp syndicate, and Shearwater Lake is an open-access day ticket water on the Longleat Estate. Both are very different venues that attract very different anglers. However, the rules are pretty similar. By that I mean there aren’t many.
We restrict the use of baitboats and some potentially confrontational practices that will cause problems on a busy day-ticket water, but in the main it’s a case of trusting the anglers to be sensible. Don’t upset the fish, each other, or me, and everything’s hunky dory.
But here’s the conundrum. Shearwater is a mixed fishery with great carp and bream fishing and some amazing silverfish sport. There used to be popular matches on there, and I want the venue to be an ‘all-rounder’, so the matches are now back. But what about the match rules? Those surrounding things like baits and methods are emotive subjects. Often in match fishing, when someone comes up with a gem of an idea that proves to be an ‘edge’, it soon gets banned. Slapping, floating baits, baiting up by hand – these are all things have been outlawed in the past. But what do match anglers prefer? A sanitised match where everyone is handcuffed to the same baits and methods, or do we like the freedom to come up with an edge? After all, that’s where most of the tactical innovations in fishing have historically come from.
What do you think? Let me know by emailing your opinion to newsdesk@anglingtimes.co.uk.
“Do we like the freedom to come up with an edge?”