The Secret Angler

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The lockdown to restrict the spread of Covid19 is nearly three weeks old. This is hard for everyone, yet does have its compensations — everywhere is much quieter. Anglers cannot go fishing, that is well established, for most of us. Most freshwater fishing is controlled by clubs and it is more difficult to break the rules. Sea fishing is free for all, so sea anglers can get away with it more easily. But there are still a minority which cannot grasp this, or prefers to ignore it. Recently on WSF, transgressions by sea anglers at Shoreham Harbour has been posted.

This caused a hostile reaction, not untypical for that site, by anglers who saw nothing wrong in fishing because, the argument goes, they are still keeping social distance from other people. This is the usual excuse and it seems some coarse anglers are using this to justify going fishing (with some casual racism thrown in):

The reasons why they shouldn’t are perfectly clear.

1. Unnecessary travel is prohibited, enforceable by law. Going fishing is unnecessary travel; it is not exercise.
2. Each transgression of the lockdown increases the risk of spreading the virus to those who will die from it, including the NHS staff (who are most at risk), the people who care for those who get ill.
3. The more people seen breaking the lockdown, the more likely that others will follow suit, leading eventually to a collapse of the lockdown and the pandemic taking off again.

Anglers should not be fishing. Most of us are behaving responsibly, and the replies to the above two posts from Facebook make this very clear. Those who cannot understand the reasons for the lockdown should simply obey the law rather than invent loopholes. They are freeloading on the rest of society and quite possibly infecting others. They may also be delaying a return to fishing for all.

For trout anglers the pandemic confinement is ill-timed. For coarse fishermen it may be fortuitous timing as the season has just ended, excepting all-year stillwater carp anglers, which seems just about everyone these days. For those and for sea anglers anytime is ill-timed. But for everyone it is a dreary necessity that we can’t go out and about as normal. One reason is that social distancing means different things to different people. For too many it meant going to the beach or the park with a crowd, or having a party or a barbecue; to carp fishermen it may mean not telling anyone your best swims or baits (hint: they use boilies). Hence the enforceable edict we all stay at home except for food shopping and exercise.

Plenty of film on the TV News and the evidence of our own eyes tells us that fear of a nasty respiratory illness is not uppermost in everyone’s minds. Traffic stills looks busy on the main roads where I live. At least the hoarding behaviour has eased in the shops. Apparently only 3 or 4 percent of citizens did this. The shortages were mainly caused by shoppers buying a few extra things, all of which amounted to empty shelves, even in perishable vegetables. To me this seems almost as selfish as the mass hoarders. There’s never been a food shortage, just a common sense shortage.

How are anglers behaving? Reading through some of the fishing social media there is plenty of evidence of antisocial attitudes, summarised as ‘Why the hell shouldn’t I go fishing, I’m not near anyone.’ Reassuringly these voices are overwhelmed by those who understand the current need to isolate, that it is the law, and that waiving the rules for one set of people means a quick return to widespread park outings, barbecues, etc. The overall health of the population and the stability of the NHS depends on adherence.

I’ll finish with the post below from the deputy administrator of worldseafishing forum. Sea fishermen are in a position to flout the rules more easily than freshwater, so it was good to read this forthright statement.

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