“Stop the snobbery over our record lists” - Des Taylor
Angling’s never been the most organised of sports, and even after 50 years of doing it there are still things about it that really confuse me.
Take our rod-caught record list. On it we have pumpkinseed, golden orfe, brown goldfish and bitterling. All these are from overseas and about as non-native as you can get, but new records for these species can still be accepted. Yet Wels catfish and grass carp, which have been here at least as long and in some cases far longer, are treated very differently. The records for both are frozen, and no further record claims will be accepted. Does that make sense?
I love fishing for catfish – they’re great sport
I know lots of serious anglers who spend thousands of hours trying to catch catfish and grass carp and have landed numerous fish over the frozen record – and yet neither the fish nor their captors get any recognition. I don’t know anyone who intentionally fishes for pumpkinseed and the other foreign imports. I suspect that any future record contenders will have been caught accidentally, yet these captures will be officially recognised.
There’s only a handful of anglers – me included! – who seriously fish for golden orfe, and yet these are also active on the record list. To add to the stupidity, that list includes zander, so why are the EA and many angling clubs still trying to eradicate the species from their waters? You couldn’t make it up.
I love fishing for cats. They’re a great sporting fish, and even though I know some have been stocked at huge weights I know of others of 100lb or more that have grown on from doubles.
Let’s draw a line under what’s happened in the past. These fish are here to stay, so let’s accept their presence and their right to a place on the record lists.
Exactly the same can be said of grass carp. Grassies are beautiful fish, and the big ones some of us are targeting in this country should get due recognition.
And while I’m at it, why zander are still being removed from some waters I have no idea. You only need to look at the Lower Severn at Upton to see that a healthy head of big zeds can live in harmony with the silverfish. Anyway, many specimen predator anglers in this country now rate a big zander as highly as a big pike, and rightly so.
This 18lb 11oz zander from the River Severn is as much a prize as a big pike
I think we should just revert to the original rules governing any record fish, which are that it has to be caught by fair means on rod and line. For me that’s it. Whether it’s been living in a wild water and never been fished for, or stocked the day before capture, it still has to be caught!
There’ll always be the knockers who try to devalue record fish. We need to be very careful we don’t allow the coarse fishing record list to become the same as that of the game world, where we have ‘wild’, ‘natural’ and even ‘cultivated’ records, and where many records, for whatever reason, have been frozen out until further notice.
Too many fish are being caught at the moment that are being lost to angling history, and that’s not good at all.
This 21lb 2oz trout was taken the day after it had been stocked, but I still had to catch it
Could this have been another record fish?
AFTER a remarkable six months during which potential new British Record crucian, perch and carp have been banked, could a possible fourth history-making fish be on the cards?
Jack Bytheway, captor of this monster ruffe, certainly thinks so. Hailing from Walsall, Jack caught the spiky specimen, measuring 15cm long, on a lure during a trip to his local canal.
“Me and my mate were fishing for perch in the hope of a few bites” he told us.
“It was a new stretch of canal with an old mooring that was full of silverfish. I was retrieving the lure really slowly when I felt a tiny snatch at it. When the fish hit again, I struck.
“I thought it was some kind of perch hybrid, but after showing my mate he revealed the potential magnitude of the catch I’d just made.”
The current British Record ruffe stands at 5oz 4dr, and although Jack didn’t weigh his catch, he’s certain his fish was close to that weight.
“We took a few pictures and released it. But at 15cm long and very fat, I’m 100 per cent sure it was around the record weight.”
Jack Bytheway’s ruffe, was it a record breaker?
New British record perch landed! - But will it be claimed?
Matt Atkins became the envy of perch fanatics nationwide when he landed this phenomenal 6lb 4oz stripey during a dawn raid at a southern stillwater.
Matt Atkins 6lb 4oz perch beats the current British record by 1oz
The 43-year-old and his friend Chris Hewett had already enjoyed a successful morning’s sport, with each landing a four-pounder, when Matt received a take just after 8am and struck into another hefty fish.
Chris and Matt had already had a dream morning with a brace of fours
He told us:
“As soon as I set the hook I could feel the heavy headshakes and said to Chris that if this wasn’t a pike, it would be a truly huge perch. After a short scrap we saw it surface and were just both speechless.
“The next few moments were a bit of a blur as I tried to keep my focus and ease the largest perch I’d ever seen over the net. That moment still hasn’t sunk in.”
The duo weighed the perch on two sets of Reuben Heaton digital scales, with each registering a weight of 6lb 4oz.
The country’s biggest perch
Despite his catch beating the official British best by 1oz, project manager Matt revealed that he won’t be submitting a claim to the British Record Fish Committee (BRFC).
“At the end of the day I’m content just knowing I’ve caught a fish of this magnitude, but ultimately I want to safeguard the venue because it has so much potential. Over the last few seasons I’ve enjoyed what’s possibly the greatest perch fishing in the country there – landing 15 fish over 4lb, of which three have been 5lb-plus.
“Now I’ve seen what it’s capable of I want to try to protect the venue more than ever.”
Matt Atkins won’t be claiming the record for this 6lb 4oz perch
Although worms and prawns are the most popular baits for big perch, Matt has enjoyed success using small roach deadbaits and a unique rig, which he explained.
“The biggest I’ve taken have all fallen for two to four-inch roach, which I pop up 2ft off the bottom using foam inserts,” he said. “The baits appear almost alive as they waft around in the water.”
Top three ratified perch records:
1 Ken Brown, 6lb 3oz, Wilstone Reservoir, September 2011
1 Neill Stephen, 6lb 3oz, Stream Valley Lakes, March 2011
3 Ricky Hilliday, 6lb, Cotswold Water Park, March 2010
Neill Stephen and his 6lb 3oz record perch in 2011
British Record Crucian Carp - The Full Story
A CARP angler has etched his name into the annals of angling history after slipping his net under a new British record crucian weighing 4lb 11oz.
The stocky specimen, which pips the previous record for the species by just 1oz, fell to Craig Smithson during a 48-hour stay on Dorset’s Milton Abbas syndicate lake.
Craig Smithson holds aloft a fish that looks set to be the new British record Crucian Carp
In an attempt to lure one of the lake’s resident carp, the 39-year-old fished a red 15mm fishmeal pop-up next to a lily bed that he’d baited with chopped 18mm boilies and pellets.
By the time dawn broke on the final morning of his session, Craig only had a tench to show for his efforts, but his fortunes took an unexpected twist at 9.30am when one of his rods signalled a twitchy take.
“The bobbin danced up and down so I just thought it was another tench,” Craig tells us.
“After picking up the rod, I wound down until I felt resistance, then started to draw the fish to the bank. It didn’t put up much of a fight but when I saw the golden flanks of a giant crucian in the edge rather than a bright green tench, I just stared at it in shock, before the panic set in.
“I scrabbled along the bank to get my net and quickly scooped it up as soon as I could.
“As I gazed down the crucian just seemed to get bigger and bigger and I was slowly realising the magnitude of what I’d caught.”
The crucian was nearly 40cm in length and 21cm wide
While resting his prize in the margins Craig rang the fishery’s owner, Wayne Little, who rushed down to the bank with his own set of scales.
By this point, three other syndicate members had also arrived on the scene to witness the weighing, measuring and photographing of the new British best.
“In the end we weighed the crucian five times on three sets of Reuben Heaton scales and each registered a matching weight of 4lb 11oz,” Craig adds.
“I was just in complete awe and trying to soak up the fact that I was holding angling history in my hands.
“To catch something that’s the biggest in the country, by design or not, is the ultimate angling achievement in my opinion, so I’m just mega pleased it’s happened to me.”
Craig has submitted a claim to the British Record Fish Committee (BRFC), to which he has already posted a set of the Reuben Heaton scales used to weigh the crucian so that they can be tested for accuracy.
A list of the witnesses’ names and their contact details, in addition to two scale samples taken from the fish, have also been provided to the BRFC to help bolster the claim and prove that the crucian is a true strain and not a hybrid.
“If the crucian is accepted as a new record then fantastic, but if it isn’t then it won’t be the end of the world,” Craig adds.
“It was just fantastic to see this fish in the flesh.”
Craig’s groundbreaking capture will come as a shock to some, but not to Milton Abbas owner Wayne Little, who says it was only a matter of time before his eight-acre lake produced a record-beating crucian.
He said:
“Around 20 years ago we stocked probably 1,500 crucians and from what I can gather there are only around 20 to 30 left, but they’re all of specimen size now.
“Last season the lake produced fish of 3lb 15oz and 4lb for one of our members, and two years ago a crucian that looked much larger than Craig’s fish was discovered in a routine netting – so I knew we wouldn’t have to wait long to see a really special one on the bank. I’m made up for Craig.”
Milton Abbas is now home to record Crucian Carp
“I’m going to apply for the British record chub"
A claim for the British record chub will be submitted after an angler fishing the River Severn caught a large specimen weighing in at 10lb 11oz.
“I’ve caught chub to 6lb 15oz from the River Severn before, but the one I landed on a recent session was in an altogether different league.”
These were the words of captor Kam Srih, who whilst stunned by what his scales were reading, checked the weight six times to make sure.
He told Angling Times:
“I was fishing at Coalport, a Rowley and District Angling Society water, and had been loosefeeding boilies for a while before casting out in a bid to get the fish competing. A short while later I had a few bangs on the tip and then the rod hooped over. Straight away the fish snagged me.
“It wouldn’t budge, so I slackened off the line and eventually it moved back out into the main flow.
“I could feel a heavy weight plodding around, but then it snagged me again, so I gave it more slack line, which did the trick once more. Suddenly, it leapt out of the water and I thought I was attached to a salmon – it had such a big tail. Once I’d eased the fish towards me and into the net I stood there shaking. It was a chub, and a huge one at that.
“I calmed myself down, and after weighing the fish on my digital scales they registered 12lb 2oz. I thought ‘that’s not right’ so I weighed it again.
“In total, it was weighed six times, and on each occasion the scales showed 12lb 2oz. I released the chub and then weighed the net, which I knew weighed 1lb 7oz, and the scales registered this exactly, which means my fish weighed 10lb 11oz.
“I’m going to apply for the British record, but whatever the outcome, to me it’s one very special chub.”
Kam Srih weighed this chub at 10lb 11oz
We will keep up to date with Kam’s claim, but with no witnesses, it will likely be rejected by the British Record Fish Committee.
Monster zander falls ounces short of British record
A zander just 2oz short of the current British record has been landed by a lure angler from an undisclosed Midlands river.
The head of the record-shaking predator
The monster 21lb 3oz predator was caught by Kieran Roche, who was left stunned when after a switch to a smaller lure the big fish struck.
Kieran’s Zander is one of the biggest ever caught in the UK
He told Angling Times:
“After spending the morning fishing a Midlands river with large 12cm lures, but getting nothing but delicate touches, I scaled down to a smaller 7cm shad. It proved to be a great switch, as on my very next cast something big hit the lure.
“Instantly I knew it was a good fish, and I shouted to my mates: ‘This is heavy!’ It fought hard for over five minutes and initially I thought it might have been a pike, so when a huge zander surfaced my legs went to jelly! It dived deep and tormented me during the fight, before finally going into the net.
“I don’t normally weigh my fish, but I had to with this one. When the scales spun round to over 20lb I was in dreamland. It’s incredible to think that if this fish had eaten a bigger breakfast, I would have been holding a new British record!
Kieran Roche and his 21lb 3oz zander
“I used an 8ft spinning rod, and a reel loaded with 20lb braid and a 14lb fluorocarbon leader. I landed a few other zander on the session too, but nothing in the same league as this monster!”
The giant fish took a 7cm realisticshad roach
To follow more of Kieran’s lure fishing adventures, be sure to check him out on -
Facebook = @kieranslurefishing
Instagram = @kierans_lure_fishing_