Leaderboard

When I started fishing 50 or more years ago, I was "naturally" drawn to it. No video's to watch, maybe Jack Hargreaves on the telly showing you the basics, but that was about it. We learnt how to make do with the tackle we had, starting off catching minnows and gudgeon, and progressing on to bigger (hopefully) fish. If you were lucky, you'd catch a 5lb Tench!! Carp fishing was almost unheard of as a "branch" of fishing, and the guys that used to fish solely for them were looked on as some kind of "weirdo", moving in the shadows or only seen at night. You imagined them carrying out some form of satanic ritual using baits that were completely foreign to us lads. No internet in those days, you'd spend your spare time trawling around your local tackle shops buying bits and pieces as you could afford them, collecting a variety of floats as you went along, with always one becoming your favourite and you'd almost be in tears if you lost it. Fast forward 50 years and anybody with a few bob to spare can become an instant carper. You can go onto ebay, and buy a "complete" carp kit for less than £50.00. Add a £3.00 bag of boilies from Decathlon, and you're away. Tip up at your local hole in the ground, pay your money and pull out a 20lb Mirror that looks like it's just landed from the planet fugly. Now you consider yourself an expert in the field, not knowing (or caring) that some old boy, years ago, spent his fishing lifetime trying to catch a fish that big, There are more people on the bank fishing today thanks to the carp industry. But there are a lot less "anglers" than there used to be.

my opinion? for what its worth, 1) tackle companies are ripping people off, why? cos they can. 2) carp anglers are nowhere near as friendly as the old guys, they are more likely to be rude, ignorant or just sarky, or even know it all (which is worse imo) and 3) most millennials and their offspring have lost the hunter gatherer Gene and are too money shy as they need to pay for a house first. *****the above statement is the opinion of the author and in no way reflect the policies/religion of the site owners*****

I think people are looking at this from a carp fishing view only. When I started fishing every lake, canal and river was solid on Saturdays and Sundays, the river and canals with match anglers and the lakes with pleasure anglers, then in virtually every harbour in the UK there would be dozens of boats taking anglers out. This reached its peak in the 1970s with a few exceptions, a hand full of lakes in the country were quiet, either because they were private or just unrewarding to the average angler, Wraysbury and surrounding pits comes to mind as does Swarkestone gravel pit. Pits and lakes were dug out in the 1960s and stocked with trout for the close season, most are now closed down used for coarse fish or shooting etc. The number of specimen hunters at that time was very small numbering in the hundreds! Move on to 2018, the number of match and pleasure anglers is a fraction of what in was in 1970 and has not been replaced by carp anglers, although their numbers have massively increased. And virtually every harbour in the UK now has but a handful of angling charter boats and a lot of these sit idol. I well remember seeing every drain and ditch in EA full of anglers, miles upon miles of the Nene, Trent etc full both banks, and sitting in Whitby, Aberystwyth, Southwold and Brixham waiting our turn to leave the harbour in a cue of boats full of working class men hoping to catch some cod or such for the freezer. Over all In the numbers game, there is no comparison the only increase is the number of Carp/specimen anglers.

£100 isnt cheap if you dont know if your kid will like it, see it from the point of view of a parent that doesnt fish. Another point people have mentioned was council lakes and rivers. I dont know of many free areas for kids to turn up and fish anymore (not in my area anyway), another issue for kids is access to get to the venues. I think its fair to say that a kid can only get into fishing if they know someone who already fishes and are able to take them (some lakes now dont allow kids under a certain age due to insurance).....

Is fishing in decline........ not yet,but will be in 10/15years time almost definitely. Dont be fooled that the X Box generation is to blame,it isn’t. The home video game exploded in the early to mid 80,s the thing that changed the next generation to get off there backside and back fishing was commercials..... No more club ticket needed just pay ya fiver and catch plenty of 1-5lb carp all day. If said before where I grew up a small town in the N/W there was at least 5 places you could get maggots/tackle etc in the 80,s by the end of 2,000 there was one poorly stocked shop. I also disagree that fishing for other species is on the up...... if that was the case why are most tackle shops 80%. carp based 🤔probably because carp kit is the biggest seller. Fishing is cheap,very cheap. Gone are the days 30years ago when you was forking out £60 for a decent rod. For £100 you could rig your nipper with a half decent set up that will see them catching fish all day. On the few occasions I go a home match at Anfield I’m lucky if I’ve got much change out of £150....... that’s quite a few fishing trips !!!! When I was younger Our local pools was full of my mates and lads around my age as well as the grumpy older ones 😆😆 but as I fish my various waters in my club waters the youngster just ain’t there.... and it’s free fishing for anyone under 16 as long as there with an adult ! I think the main problem is this current generation the teenagers/early 20,s just aren’t interested in fishing as crazy as that sounds. Whether they just don’t ‘get’ it or there’s far more appealing things to do (and don’t give me the X Box excuse) because trust me I was rarely off my Atari/Spectrum at there age,the only time I wasn’t was when I was fishing !!!!! Gaming NEVER stopped me angling,I just truly believe that the youth of today just ain’t that interested in angling as much as we was at there age. Everything changes per generation...... footy changed,computing has changed everything has change,including fishing. Of course there will ALWAYS be Angler’s just not the numbers we’ve known for the last 50 years,which is sad really. Thats my two peneth anyway 😬

Only reason I mentioned it is because I accidently cut a groove in to the plastic connecting the bail arm to the line roller and I’ve got it leccy taped up to stop the line catching. Carpy yellow and green too!!

I feel like there’s been an increase in carpyness recently. I think we should take it back to the old school, dodgy banksticks, makeshift brollies, etc. That’ll get rid of the instant carper. I can see the next daiwa reel now, comes with taped on handle knobs and a cracked reel seat as standard.

I see what your saying but if your child didn’t like angling chuck the stuff on eBay and take a £40 loss. I was just trying to compare angling to other hobbies/pastimes mate. A local commercial will charge around £8 for a full days ticket,I wouldn’t have a clue how much a round of golf is but I’m thinking around the £20/25 mark for a few hrs (any golfers on here who can put me straight) Footy is even worse...... £45 for 90mins 🙄🙄 My point being after an initial outlay basic angling for a dad and lad is cheap as chips.

I don't buy the there's more anglers on the banks these days . Trout/fly fishing is almost non existent , sea fishing doesn't get the numbers it used to Beaches used to be lined up with anglers when the cod where in just doesn't happen any more . The match scene has died , very few general anglers about . Take a walk down your local river or canal at the weekend and you'll be lucky to see anyone fishing , now think back to the 70's , 80's . Even the lakes used to have more anglers , a small lake I fish used to have about 18 swims and would get busy now its mainly carp it's down to 6 swims due to needing more room. Some swims used to have 3 or 4 different general anglers in one day i.e the morning angler , the afternoon and then the evening now that swim may look busier today but the same angler is in there for 48hrs . We fall ourselves that carp angling is big but I don't think its ever hit the numbers that the match and general scene did in the 70's , 80's . Around here most club memberships are down . Must get on ' need to earn money '

oh yeah your 100% right but you know lego will get used more then once.

Dunno buddy...... a decent Lego set is more than 100 quid these days!

I know exactly what you mean mate. Most of my closest mates don't fish at all and they're always sending me links to articles about places like Holme Fen and ridiculous captures of 10 x 50 lb imports in a single session. It pains me to think that they believe I'm into that scene. It is embarrassing, it makes my cringe.

I’m of the same opinion and broadly of the same generation. I’ve fished since before I can actually remember; my old man started taking me as a 4 year old. We fished on a local club water for just about anything that came along but occasionally Dad would break out his old MKIV and target the Carp population. There were lots of kids my age on the same water doing exactly the same. By the age of 11 I was targetting Carp with my 9ft solid glass spinning rod, Mitchell CAP and fairy liquid top indicators...... At the time I was most definitely in the minority and the majority were general coarse anglers and ‘match’ types. I was always quite proud to tell people I was a Carp angler-it was a sub culture with very little exposure and next to no commercial value. How things have changed! Now I’m almost embarassed to call myself a Carp specialist because of the atmospere and associations with commercial tie-ups, and desperate wannabes. A long time friend of mine has all but ‘retired’ from fishing for the same reasons. He is a fantastic, gifted angler who, if he chose to, would be a ‘household name’; I know a couple and have fished alongside a few. Sad really. I’ve gone a little off topic here and no longer fish locally but I occasionally drive past the old club waters and rarely see kids or even general coarse anglers, just bivvies and barrows.

During the early to late eighties every canal and council lake were full of match/coarse anglers, I know, I was there fishing amongst the grumpy old gits who didn't have time for anyone younger than 150 years of age. All my mates went, and their dad's or uncles or more. Now, the local council lakes and canals just aren't the same, you might see a few over the weekends but nothing compared to back when I was coarse fishing. Yeah, I think carp fishing has a bit more appeal, and as a consequence a few more do it, maybe some of the coarse anglers have gone into carp fishing but you only have to look at the industry as a whole to see its only going in one direction. The industry has been saturated with tackle and bait companies, I just don't think the current situation is sustainable, take a look at ebay, I bet that in itself has done a lot of damage to sales. Simple fact is, money is a bit thin on the ground so new tackle just isn't being bought. I bet most of the particle we all buy isn't from any bait company it's all bought from animal feed shops, purely and simply because it saves us a bit of money. I genuinely just don't think a lot of kids want to go out in the cold and go fishing. Gaming has played it's role but social media has also had an affect.

Whys that? i was fishing the old deep lake at willows farm or rather bowmans in hertfordshire as it was then 2 of them came round and as they came close i had a run and they said its ok we can wait. and thats the last time it was checked time before that i was over fairlands in stevenage and it was the old NRA ticket or whatever it was then i cant remember cant remember before that so lets say twice in 25 years but to be fair most of my fishing is on club waters so whether or not they actually can get on those i dont know

I laugh at these people who say they haven't had their licence checked in years, for 5 years on the trot I was checked at least once a year on various waters. In Suffolk on the Park Lake when I still had Post Office receipt, then in Dobbs Weir and around a month later at Nazeing. Is fishing in decline? I think to some extent carp fishing is, thank goodness, maybe partly due to the older genuine anglers getting fed up of the current bull of the carp record, which I think before long will not exist due to the legal imports, what weight a fish is stocked at, grown on, basically the Big Rig scenario or even a dubious import like Oak Lodge and the catfish record. It was silly for a record to go from 50lb to 108lb, someone was bound to take notice! Is that licence sales or licence money? One carp angler buys a 3 rod licence now, instead of two 2 rod licences, which counters both the decline in licence sales and money. I think other 'disciplines' are on the increase, I for example now do more fishing for other species than I used to. From 1992 to 2010, I pretty much fished only for carp. Yet now I am back chasing roach, pike and other species. However as a whole there are fewer younger anglers coming into fishing. The joys of X-box, PS4 etc, take them away from an outdoor life, as does the fewer male parents (in most cases) taking their sons (and daughters) fishing. In addition to that, there is still a 'push' towards carp fishing, yet a youngster blanks and the kit does a trip into the cupboard never to cone out again. If they were catching fish, like roach and perch then they would want to continue going. Don't forget children under 12 don't have to pay for a rod licence at all. I also bet bet a few 3 rod set-ups include the 'sons rod'...

Make no mistake it is low, so if your the type of angler that likes a bit of space the lo pro probably isn't the one for you. Both the mozzi mesh and wrap arent whole wraps, but I only use the mozzi mesh as I can't stand mozzi's buzzing around my ears when I'm trying to sleep. Now their gone it'll be full open front for me until next summer. I'm one of those anglers that packs up just before first light during the winter months so it's important my shelter packs up, packs down and easily fits into my quiver without any hassle, it's an important aspect when packing up in the rain. The thing I like about brollies, is there up and done, pram hood style bivvies need setting up on the ground so there all ready wet before you've started. I'll even go as far to say it's made moving mid session so much easier and lighter. I like it, it could do with a vent at the back but that's it, otherwise it's great for me.