The Traditional Fisherman's Forum

Afternoon men,

I took a photo of this in The Barely Mow Oxfordshire. Any truth in it?

I thought we had Carp in the... Sorry, ye old stew ponds dug out my Monks
That go way back?

Mr B

Izaak may have written that but almost certainly carp were being bred by monks and in stew ponds of big houses etc in the middle ages and possibly the Romans may have brought them here as well.

I thought so.... I will have to Read The Compleat Angler again... Been a few years... Is that a quote from the book?

The Barley Mow at Clifton Hampden - I hate to think how many years it is since I've been there!

If you fancy a good read, you may wish to read Aphrodite's Carp, written by John Langridge, published by Medlar Press. Its a cracking read, and it covers the everything regarding the history of the carp......

Merlot wrote:If you fancy a good read, you may wish to read Aphrodite's Carp, written by John Langridge, published by Medlar Press. Its a cracking read, and it covers the everything regarding the history of the carp......

You beat me to it Merlot - my thoughts exactly when I read the first post in this thread. Its a really good book that every angler interested in carp should read. So much information in it. I found the short section on carp's vision with the diagrams really fascinating.

Snape already knows this, so please excuse me Snape for going over "trodden ground" but the local trout stillwater here also holds wild carp that were stocked in the 12th century by the cistercian monks. Coarse fishing for the carp is also allowed for £5 per day. Although Hardly anybody fishes for them regularly (I know not why). The pool also holds tench, which I've been wondering what the reason is for tench to be stocked? I know they were known as the Doctr fish and were beleived to hold healing properties and used in medicine but I don't know whether they were stocked for that reason or for the purpose of keeping the carp healthy. What ever reason, it's certainly kept the carp healthy.

It's only ever been stocked with coarse fish by the monks, although it does see a fortngihtly stocking of Rainbow trout.

I wouldn't mind betting that the strain of Carp that are in there are amongst the oldest in Britain.

The year before last, a wildy of 14lb was caught and the association members were asking if there was a record for wild carp.

As Snape quite rightly said at the time though, there is no record for wild carp because nobody could be sure it was a wild carp due to other strains being stocked into our waters.

Hi Kingfisher - are you saying that the trout stillwater you are referring to actually has carp that are the direct desendants of those stocked in the 12th century?

I would have expected that to be very difficult to determine as there could easily have been many further stockings over such a long period.

It would be interesting to see any photo of any carp ever caught from there.

I think thats a quote from: (i won't spell this right, dyslexia rlues KO!)

A Treatise of Fyshing with an Angle. Dame Juliana Berners. a couple of hundred years before Izaak.

I've always doubte the quote too, wouldnot suprise me at all in the romans hadn't introduced Carp.

Gaz

She mentions carp as a new rarity, but couldn't have known about turkeys; she wrote the treatise way before Columbus set out.