Re: Walcott Lake

Meatman (and anyone else interested in the saga):

Yes, the western part of the lake suffers equally from weed problems, although when I visited last night the western arm looked much clearer: sometimes its the other way round with the Birmingham side relatively clear and the Ludlow side solid. Ludlow have given up the fishing on this side of the lake and it appears now that it is run by a syndicate.

The lake was relatively weed-free and easily fishable until 2005-2006. Something happened over the winter of 2005 and since then the lakes have been choked with weed (Elodea - Canadian Pondweed), and floating filamentous algae ever since. I have heard that a small sewage works that used to discharge into the feeder stream to the lakes was upgraded, which resulted in lower levels of nutrients entering the lakes, which caused the algal colour to drop out allowing rooted weeds to thrive.

Some years and seasons are worse than others and there have been attempts to deal with the weed in both halves of the lake but with very limited success, the weed returns within weeks. I have to say I don't think the weed is as bad as it was in the mid 2000's.

Fishing is HARD. I fish exclusively for tench but rarely get any despite seeing signs of them on most visits. I have had up to five in a sitting (to 6.5 lb) but I haven't caught one for three years! I usually catch a few bits, roach, perch, rudd and hybrids. I have not seen any bream since 2010, there are some large carp but these are rarely seen, and there are jack pike.

I'm not sure what the future of the fishery is, since the announcement from admin suggests that BAA will retain the fishing rights on the lake but close it to fishing, which is intriguing. A great shame, as despite the difficult fishing I have grown rather attached to the place. I do hope a plan for the fishery can be worked out.

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