It is difficult for me to comment how I would like to on here as it would be very much biting the hand that feeds me, but I really find it difficult these days to associate with a lot of the new generation people who decide to fish for carp. I reserve the word angling and angler quite a lot.
What I do know is that there would be very few of them who would tolerate the hard work and blanks we endured when I started fishing for carp before the hair and bolt rigs. We had inadequate clothing, uncomfortable seating and still awaiting the 50" umbrella being made available to the angling world (not to mention the 60" the ovals and the marquees seen on the banks in more recent years). Myself I enjoy the modern comfort and warmth and wouldn't want to go back to 'living under a 45" brolly' which was necessary if you lived where I did and had to travel a long way if you wanted to fish for larger fish. Quick afternoon or day sessions were often a little impractical and I always preferred to be in my pitch and cast out ready for dawn (nice girl is Dawn) rather than getting out of bed at silly o'clock and arriving at my swim disturbing it at dawn.
For a few years whilst working at the shop and being constantly asked by the customers what I fished for I proudly stuck my chest out and said carp. By the mid-80's however my answer was that I fish for most species, I no longer felt the connection with the people turning up at the lakes to fish for carp as I had those who were there in the 70's and very early 80's. No longer had the newbies got that 'strange look in the eye'. Most carp anglers around our way pre hair and bolt rig days were different sorts of character completely. You could spot a carp angler in a crowd if that makes any sense. These days you can walk around a supermarket and it seems every 12th bloke fishes for carp. Everyone I meet these days outside of fishing who ask me my profession knows someone who fishes for carp.
It is a crowded world out there but as in the Traditional Anglers and the Modern Anglers there are some very special people I would happily spend a lot of time with but also an awful lot I would be finding my excuses to move on.
As has been mentioned a few times I too feel the days of the off the shelf magazine are getting shorter in life. There will always be niche specialist markets but the answers to the 'how to's' can now all be so easily Googled.
Didn't know I was going to write all of that, I was only going to thank Gurn but as usual got a tad carried away. Please don't label a type of angler and stick them in one box though. I went to a carp meeting last night and there were a handful of carp anglers in there who would have mixed in and been accepted amongst any group of hardened angler. There weren't many though and strangely enough they all ended up in an area of the room together and soon the conversation was back to our early days. I love it!
although somethings never change.......i'm still not allowed to stay out all night !!
