The TPU UK Clubhouse

[Tatty_Two]

Nice Pike, about 9 pounds?

 

[FreedomEclipse]

Nice Pike, about 9 pounds?

A hair under 15lb. I dont think she was in the best condition though. (her head also looks slightly disproportionate to the rest of her body...)

Not sure if she was sick or just an old girl. This photo doesnt quite paint the whole picture. Despite her length, she didnt have much girth to her and she didnt put up much of a scrap either like they normally would. Ive pulled out 5-12lb pike from the local river that fought 100x as hard as this one for one or two minutes. This was more like dragging a snag across the bottom of the pit

I thought i was snagged, she probably had no idea she was hooked till i had her close to the bank and gave her a poke with the net to try and get it under her after that she gave a few lunges for freedom then she was pooped.

got her unhooked, weighed, few photos then she was back in and resting in the net for about 5 mins. She was floating upside down for most of that time and i honestly thought i had killed her by having her out too long but she recovered and just slowly 'floated' away.

I would have been absolutely distraught if she had died. The place i'm fishing doesnt have that many larger ones like these so its quite a bit of luck hooking into one.

To put it into perspective, Ive observed people sit there with two dead baits in for the entire day and not had a single one.

Need to remember to carry a tape measure with me.

 

[lexluthermiester]

@Tatty_One What do you think?



View attachment 264115


It was caught on a lure no bigger than my thumb

That's a week's worth of good eating you have in your hands!

Need to remember to carry a tape measure with me.

I believe you. I've caught a few big ones like that, 15lbs seems about right.

 

[Tatty_Two]

15 pounds is a nice size, the biggest I caught was about 10 years ago on the River Severn near me and that was 15.2 and that was on a small spoon spinner, I chase Carp these days though.

 

[FreedomEclipse]

That's a week's worth of good eating you have in your hands!

yeah... we dont do that here I mean there are those that do. But they arent 'from here' - if you get what im saying (trying not to be too political about it )

15 pounds is a nice size, the biggest I caught was about 10 years ago on the River Severn near me and that was 15.2 and that was on a small spoon spinner, I chase Carp these days though.

rivers/canals around me are super tough. Polluted waterways, people taking fish for the pot, C&RT handing out boat permits to every tom dick and harry...
Theres not a whole lot of pike to be had but there has been a resurgence of big river/canal carp (and bream) here but im not so sure how long it will last with all the removals going on.
I know its different for folks up north. Some of youtubers i watch are from places like birmingham, yorkshire, newcastle etc etc and they have had absolutely no problems pulling pike out of their rivers within a matter of minutes. Here its virtually impossible due to London being the way it is.


I used to chase carp myself. I did for around 10 years but its not really my idea of fun anymore. I wont even dead bait for pike. Being glued to one spot while waiting for a bite is no fun

The pike i caught was caught at a private fishery im currently guesting at. I became famous as the only twat willing to walking around the lake with a spinning setup while everyone else was laying back in their chairs, cracking open many beers, spodding their entire months grocery shop into the water and waiting for the fish. (and now im also famous for being a random bloke that caught a one of these mythical pike) - can you tell why i dont carp fish?

hardly anyone goes after the pike or the perch.

 

[lexluthermiester]

yeah... we dont do that here I mean there are those that do. But they arent 'from here' - if you get what im saying (trying not to be too political about it )

Ah you do catch and release! That's cool. I do that most of the time. Our fishing licenses here allow for and encourage catch & consume, to a limit.

 

[FreedomEclipse]

Ah you do catch and release! That's cool. I do that most of the time. Our fishing licenses here allow for and encourage catch & consume, to a limit.

I mean there are bylaws in some parts of the country that says that people are allowed to take a certain number of fish for eating but in my opinion:

- the waterways are very polluted here. Not just from boat people dumping their trash in the river but local businesses dumping and flushing their trash into it too. Depending on the river and the location, It is recommended not to swim or bathe in it no matter how hot the weather is. A lot of sewage gets pumped into my local river and it was one of the UKs most polluted rivers once upon a time.

- You either release or you take beyond the legal limit or you come back and do it at night - Either way nobody checks and the waterways arent policed very much so 99% people take the fish anyway regardless of the bylaws. Maybe if I managed to catch some trout or salmon id consider taking it home but not before i clear it with the people who will be eating it first as im not a generally a big lover of eating fish. In any case, once i tell them i pulled it out of the local river, im sure they'd tell me to throw it back.

In some places the waters are a lot less polluted though and if i had to take a fish for the pot id consider it but otherwise id leave that to when im fishing on pier catching some sea bass.

If im out camping and needing to catch some fish for dinner then that is an entirely different story. Id be out in the countryside with fresher and cleaner flowing rivers/streams to catch fish from.

 

[Tatty_Two]

I always release and am careful in how I handle the fish and for how long, I work on the theory that if I catch a 20 pound carp, I wanna catch him again when he is a 30 pound carp, I cannot do that if I ate him

 

[lexluthermiester]

I cannot do that if I ate him

True! But here where they purposefully stock the fish for consumption, it's a given. Regional differences thing.

 

[AusWolf]

Maybe I'm the wild one here, but I've never understood why someone would try to pierce the inside of an animal's mouth with a hook without the intention of eating it. It just seems like pointless torture to me.

I mean, I get the "sit and relax in nature" aspect of it, but I can do that without buying expensive fishing gear.

 

[FreedomEclipse]

Maybe I'm the wild one here, but I've never understood why someone would try to pierce the inside of an animal's mouth with a hook without the intention of eating it. It just seems like pointless torture to me.

I mean, I get the "sit and relax in nature" aspect of it, but I can do that without buying expensive fishing gear.

Mainly Sport and fishing is a hobby for a lot of people as well as a survival skill

Though the jury is out if the fish actually have any pain receptors in their mouths or not.

The most important thing is you treat the fish with care while you have it hooked or out of the water.

Some fishes mouths are extremely boney and they shouldn't feel pain when peirced by a hook.

Hooking a fish doesn't have any negative effect on its well being so long as the fish is handled correctly and the hook isn't left in when it's returned

-----

Also when you have a fish hooked - the idea isnt that you yank on the rod so hard that you rip the spine out of the fish or send it into orbit.

A lot of fishing rods are quite forgiving meaning that they have some flex in them to act as a buffer that absorbs any sort of serious lunges or pulls away from you. You also have the brake/clutch on the reel itself so that a fish can strip line off it if it decides to fight - All this to stop the hook tearing up the fishes mouth. Keep the rod tip up, line tight and let the rod do all the work.

Its not really torture at all. Especially when it comes to carp fishing. In a lot of private fisheries i have been to, everyone is constantly emptying dump trucks full of loose feed into the water.
And while this generally spoils the fishing for everyone else because the fish are pretty much always fed. All these fish get a free all you can eat buffet 24/7

 

[FreedomEclipse]

Not as big as the last one but looking a lot more healthier and put up more of a fight.

had it within 15mins of starting the session and blanked for the rest of the day Even the perch werent interested in anything i was throwing out no matter how many times i changed lures.

 

[Space Lynx]

Cawston Press Cloudy Apple sparkling water, is the best drink I have ever had in my life. Thank you UK. Thank you for the most delicious drink I ever tasted.

 

[the54thvoid]

When can I stop being British?

 

[AusWolf]

When can I stop being British?

Why would you not want to be British?

 

[FreedomEclipse]

When can I stop being British?

but youre Scottish?

 

[the54thvoid]

Why would you not want to be British?

Truss me, I'd Sunak talk about something else but I need to be conservative with my thoughts and it'd be wrong to labour my explanation. In general, I'd elect to be somewhere else.

but youre Scottish?

Still a Brit, tho. Passport says so.

 

[Tatty_Two]

Truss me, I'd Sunak talk about something else but I need to be conservative with my thoughts and it'd be wrong to labour my explanation. In general, I'd elect to be somewhere else.



Still a Brit, tho. Passport says so.

I am sure somewhere around here somebody could help you with that for a modest fee, I mean we get enough fake document spammers here

 

[AusWolf]

Truss me, I'd Sunak talk about something else but I need to be conservative with my thoughts and it'd be wrong to labour my explanation. In general, I'd elect to be somewhere else.

It could be worse. You could live somewhere where your only choice for leadership is either a lunatic whose answer to every problem is building walls or a demented old man who keeps forgetting his own address.

 

[Space Lynx]

When can I stop being British?

Ironically me and my gf have been quite sad today because the laws are so complicated in UK we can't figure out how I can stay in UK long term. Which is ironic, because I am the type of person the UK should want to come in to their country, I work, pay my taxes, have a Master's Degree, don't drink, don't gamble, don't smoke, etc etc

I'd rather be here than anywhere else, I have to say Sainsbury's is my all time favorite grocery store. 3 quid for 5 pre-cooked bbq flavored chicken legs, damn it is good. Highly recommend if you need a cheap budget meal. I also will recommend the pumpkin katsu vegan meal Sainsbury's does, it is amazing and only costs 4 quid. I sort of live off oven meals or micrwave, I tend to do more pre-made oven meals than microwave though. Sainsbury's never has failed me though, I enjoyed 90% of what I had.

 

[TheoneandonlyMrK]

Why would you not want to be British?

When Pm number three turns up without a say, surely another first round the corner with bojos return party, you couldn't write this shit.
And I am starting to think the mobile phone, internet and people's stupidity are a bad combination.

 

[Space Lynx]

And I am starting to think the mobile phone, internet and people's stupidity are a bad combination.

Agreed. Something weird is happening.

 

[TheoneandonlyMrK]

Agreed. Something weird is happening.

Well my annoying idiotic friends didn't get any brighter (fortunately not all), youth do better but I definitely know more people into total nonsense, I'm talking flat earth illuminati scale wtaf rubbish.

 

[the54thvoid]

... I am the type of person the UK should want to come in to their country, I work, pay my taxes, have a Master's Degree, don't drink, don't gamble, don't smoke, etc etc

Stay over that side of the water, Puritan.

Edit: The UK heavily taxes drink and tobacco - you need to do one or other to contribute.

 

[Space Lynx]

Stay over that side of the water, Puritan.

Edit: The UK heavily taxes drink and tobacco - you need to do one or other to contribute.

let me clarify, like once every two or three months I will have a Kopparberg cider, or a Bulmers/Magnas? don't know how to spell it. I don't drink like most normal people do though, l think I went like 3 years without drinking once and didn't even notice. it's just not my thing. and even on the rare occassions I do drink, i don't ever do more than half a pint really lol so your point still stands.

I don't like most alcohol though, only a select few ciders.