Conscience and the close season
At this time of year there is a great deal of debate about whether we need —
or do not need — a close season for coarse fish.
To make things clearer to those anglers who only started fishing in recent years,
a little history might come in useful.
For the greatest part of my angling life, fishing for coarse fish was forbidden
before June 16. Just a few fisheries in the South of England allowed all year
round fishing strangely enough and on waters under the control of the Yorkshire
Water Authority fishing opened on June 1.
How excited we old-timers got as June 1 approached and we would usually be beside
the water before midnight on the last day of May ready to cast out as the clocks
struck 12. We called this our ‘stolen fortnight’ and how we enjoyed
it.
Now most stillwaters stay open all year round and only rivers stay close until
mid-June.
I understand the reasons for this. Fishery owners need the revenue that they get
from anglers in the spring and since most fisheries are vastly overstocked these
days the fish need free samples of food that anglers throw in to sustain their
condition..
Somehow though, I have not yet succumbed to the temptation of fishing for coarse
fish, even on stillwaters, in what was, for the most part of my angling life,
the closed season. Yes I do know that the majority of readers will not agree with
me on this subject, and they will think me silly, but my conscience troubles me
if I think about fishing out of season. Of course, there is another very valid
reason why I feel like this.
The spring months are a very good time indeed to go trout fishing — and
fly fishing for trout has brought me so much pleasure for a great many years,
especially since Derbyshire is such a great trout fishing county.
Nothing I have written here implies any criticism of anglers who do fish quite
legally in springtime on stillwaters, and perhaps one day I may find the temptation
of fishing some comfortable well-stocked lake in spring too much to resist!