Please make time in your diary to attend this year's meetings. It's important members have their say in the running of our Club and the annual Game and AGM meetings facilitate this. We'll be posting more details in the coming weeks but the key information is here for you to make a note of.

This year's annual Club meetings

By Stuart Hitchman, Club Secretary

It is not often these days that a river match outperforms a Stillwater, but that is exactly what happened on Sunday 6 January. Indeed outperformed is a somewhat weak description for the magic that transpired on this mild overcast winter’s day.

I knew something special was on the cards when I heard that Chris Burgess was catching a roach a chuck. On one of my numerous visits to observe his prowess he confirmed that it was a fish a chuck and more importantly 4 fish to the pound. Hugh Miles pegged immediately upstream was also bagging with what appeared a slightly larger stamp. However, his catch rate was not as prolific.

Bailey’s River Match - A Sign of Things to Come

By Stuart Hitchman, Club Secretary

Chris Burgess with a gargantuan 33lb 12oz of Stour roach

A truly remarkable day’s fishing on the Wimborne Strour and evidence, if needed, that huge nets of roach are still possible from this valuable river

Hugh Miles with a fantastic back-up of 18lb

It is not often you get the opportunity to exploit a gift horse for a second time, but that is exactly what happened on Friday 23 November 2018.

The eagerly anticipated second round of electrofishing was to commence. Dan Gale, the class tutor from Sparsholt College had kindly agreed to support the Club in its effort to safely remove additional Carp from Poole park freshwater lake.

A second bite of the cherry

By Stuart Hitchman, Club Secretary

The electrofishing team in action

Sparsholt students display captured Carp in the holding nets

His students worked tirelessly throughout the day and despite the challenges, which included deep silt, were able to capture a further 75 Carp with a combined weight of 653lb.The biggest fish of the day was recorded at 18lb.

All of these fish were safely transported and released into the larger lake at Creekmoor. It is clear from the positive feedback on Facebook that members are already reaping the rewards from this stocking.

A few pounds short of the magical 20 mark

Any true angler would be saddened to hear of any wildlife in distress, especially when it happens on one of our waters. Angling permits us to be close to nature and we need to respect the environment in which we follow our beloved pastime. The creatures that inhabit our lakes and rivers have more of a right to be there than we do.

Sadly, a member of the local community at Creekmoor was alerted to a distressed bird late at night a few weeks ago. A heron had become entangled in discarded carp fishing line and was heard making loud calling noises. The RSPCA were alerted and the bird was taken to a local veterinary surgery where it received treatment and rest. Thankfully the bird was safely released a few days later

How important our wildlife is

By James Nash, Club Media Officer

The heron having been found by a resident

Early the next morning on arrival of the RSPCA

Damage to the birds leg

The offending line found wrapped around the birds legs

It is inexcusable to leave such line behind after a session. Most lakes have bins for us to use and we can always take any discarded kit home with us.

The heron was lucky to have escaped this and could so easily have died due to someone's negligence.

We urge all members to ensure they leave the banks clearer than when they arrived and to collect any rubbish at all they see on their travels. Anyone found to have left litter in this way will find themselves explaining their actions in front of the Committee and will almost certainly lose their book.

Please do your bit and keep our venues safe for our wildlife. It's extremely precious and deserves our utmost respect.

Chris Crompton, the Club’s Membership Secretary has been working on his end of year statistics.

Overall participative field sports are facing a decline in numbers. Fishing has not escaped that decline, which in some large measure is because getting young entrants to the sport has become ever more difficult. Part of the problem is one of leisure choices, angling now competes against a wide range of other activities and it is not just computer games. It also seems to me that the more frenetic way in which families organise themselves does not readily help a young person wanting to spend half a day to a day by the waterside. Leisure seems to be available in smaller bite sized chunks.

I find it odd that the freedoms I had as a boy, to go off fishing with friends, are no longer considered the norm.  The need to check up on the whereabouts of children on the one hand and the requirement to  be risk averse as a land owner, to avoid possible litigation on the other put stresses in the system that were not there sixty years ago.

It is, therefore, a real pleasure to be able to report that the youth membership of the Club almost doubled last year. The number of junior and minors has increased from 57 in 2017 to 100 in 2018.

If I was going to identify one reason for this increase it is because the Club has actively organised days when families and children have been invited to come and try out fishing. The Committee intends to do the same this year, but it could not happen without Sean Harris’s extraordinary enthusiasm, as Welfare Officer, helped and cajoled by a group of individuals who all put in some real hard work. However, if there is one area where the hard work seems instantly worthwhile it is helping children to learn to fish; there is an infinite reward provided by the looks on faces of those who have caught for the first time.

We have been fortunate to also get help with bait and tackle for children to use; and our thanks goes out to local outlets and some generous benefactors too for their assistance. Money has also been raised by the sale of tackle donated to the Club and this is being ploughed back for the juniors.

If you know a family who might be interested in trying a fishing experience, give them Sean’s email address: welfare@wimborneanddistrictanglingclub.co.uk

This year the Club also intends to run a trout fishing parent and child day at Winterborne Zelston, this will be open to the public but also open to Members and fishing juniors who would like to try catching a trout on a fly. Dates to be announced.

Club membership

By Mike Hirsh, Club Chairman

Fishing the River at Canford before Christmas and struggling to keep my eyes in focus on the top of my float I was approached by a fellow angler who asked if any of the bream we stocked years ago were still to be caught.  I answered in the negative because much to our disappointment the bream had all but disappeared within the space of a year of their arrival.  After he had gone my thoughts drifted back to other occasions when we so carefully introduced fish and never saw them again.  How difficult it is I thought, to predict outcomes, when Mother Nature is involved in the process.

A long time ago, the inhabitants of a small island in the Atlantic had no Christmas trees for the festive period so some were imported from another place, but the trees had not been sprayed before delivery and they were infested with tiny mites. Soon the mites spread to the beautiful cedar trees on the island causing most of them to wither and die back.  Something had to be done, the mites had to go to save the remaining trees so the island government decided, rather than to use a pesticide, the best solution was to introduce a natural predator to eat the mites.  In other places tiny mites were a favourite food of the lady bug so great numbers of lady bugs were introduced all across the island, but the lady bugs soon tired of eating mites and moved to eating the islanders crops.  Something had to be done, the lady bugs had to go so the island government decided to introduce a natural predator in the form of a lizard that in other places, ate lady buds.  Small lizards already existed on the island and they were much loved by the islanders as they feasted on cockroaches but soon the little lizards were reduced in numbers by their larger imported cousins, much to the annoyance of the islanders.  Something had to be done, the bug eating lizards had to go so the island government decided to import a lizard eating predator in the form of a large bird that in other places fed on bug eating lizards.  The large birds soon tired of eating lizards and started to catch small fish and drove away the little blue birds that fished in the pools and were much loved by the islanders.  The islanders scared off the large birds at every opportunity and all over the island they placed out nest boxes for the comfort of little blue birds.  The island government was in despair and decided to abandon the idea of importing any further natural predators.  The lady bugs, lizards and large birds all still live quite happily on the island much to the annoyance of the islanders who hold the government responsible for their unwelcome behaviour.  The mites, well they died out eventually but then a strange thing occurred, many of the cedar trees that appeared dead were in fact just lying dormant, this being their natural defence to them coming under attack from tiny mites.  The following year the beautiful cedar trees started to grow new shoots and most have now recovered.

The following lessons were learnt by the island government:

• Mother nature and hindsight are wonderful things.
• Doing nothing may be not be popular but it may be the best solution.
• Assumption is the mother of disaster.
• If you find yourself in a hole, stop digging.
•  

The Committee is being advised to introduce a predatory species into the top lake at Edmondsham, this to reduce the number of small fish and the inevitable result of our recent stocking of crucian carp.  I have listened carefully to the good advice from those who seem to know about these things and whilst some suggest chub is the best predator, others say we should stock perch.

Wish us luck with this one!

Thoughts on Stocking

By Brian Heap, Club President

The new walkway at Zelston

By Paul Nicholls, Club Game Secretary

The new walkway at Zelston is now complete. May the Club offer a huge thank you to Bob, Paul, Tony and Gordon who's efforts have allowed this important improvement.