Younger men come forward to help UCAPA protect River Clyde for future generations

Feb 14 2008 By Tom McGregor

ANNUAL general meetings used to be exciting occasions. No matter what they were about, this was generally the only occasion during the year when members could voice their opinions about how the office-bearers had been performing their duties.

Fifty years ago, I did not fully understand who the various characters were at meetings of the United Clyde Angling Protective Association.

All that really concerned me was whether the subscriptions were going up for the following season.

Somehow it did not surprise me that these meetings were so well attended that it was often necessary for dozens of anglers to stand outside the main hall, trying to hear the proceedings through open doors.

Over the years, a lot of those who attended my first few meetings became my friends.

To a certain extent, it worries me that many of the same people are still there. What this means is that the average age of those working on behalf of Clyde anglers is threatening to go through the roof.

For what might have been my 50th consecutive year, I attended the AGM at the end of last month.

For the first time, I pushed my way to the front in order to have a good chance of hearing what was being said.

I sat beside some old men and discovered that they were the same age as me! The good news was that when I looked around I could see quite a few fit young men.

Some of them have volunteered to become directors of the association. If they stay the course, they might eventually take over the whole show.

When the chairman, Matt Mitchell, was inviting members to become directors, he stated quite honestly that he could promise them nothing but hard work and a great deal of unwarranted criticism.

There has been a lot of this splashing around on the Internet recently. It was reminiscent of the tirades of Lord Haw Haw and has been treated with the same derision afforded to that other comical propagandist.

One of the criticisms levelled at the association was that it was not united. The fact that members of three clubs were in attendance, and very supportive, gave the lie to that.

It is also true that the association is on good terms with the other major players in the upper reaches of the Clyde as well as several of those downstream of Glasgow. This is very important for angling because the Scottish Government is taking an interest in our sport.

The Clyde area is almost unique in that the fishings are in the hands of the ordinary working man and not controlled by the landed gentry.

A Conservative Government once tried to sell the Clyde's salmon to the highest bidder but was persuaded otherwise.

The Scottish Executive was seen to be plunging headlong into following the English way of doing things. It is to be hoped that the Scottish Government will keep Scottish angling in Scottish hands.

UCAPA are not alone in making submissions to the consultative process, which is still ongoing.

This has been helped thanks to a previous chairman, Willie Miller, whom Matt Mitchell praised for his tireless work in keeping the rest of us informed about what is happening on the national political scene.

It is in communicating with the public that governments have the biggest difficulty. They can only talk at us but, believe it or not, we can talk to them.

The River Clyde Fishery Management Trust was seen as the conduit through which the government could talk to anglers in our region. Unfortunately, it has stumbled recently.

Having twice failed to present audited books to its own general meetings, its own directors voted unanimously to seek a fresh start. So far, I understand it has not been possible to assemble a quorum. Watch this space for I have invited the new committee, when it is formed, to keep me informed about their progress.

Scottish Water has come in for some criticism over suggestions that it has sometimes not done enough to control some discharges.

To redress the balance a little, they were praised for the action they took when they were alerted to a massive build-up of debris at the bridge carrying one of their pipes over the Clyde.

UCAPA had been trying to clear potential blockages but this one was in danger of defeating them, largely because of the weather.

To their credit, Scottish Water sent in a team to clear this problem and did the same at another bridge for which they have some responsibility.

Another task for one of the committees of UCAPA is attempting to keep spawning burns clear.

This is a never-ending job but special attention will be given to the bed of some burns which are in danger of becoming so compacted that eventually neither trout nor salmon will be able to lay their eggs there safely.

One member of the river management team said: “That's summer taken care of then.”

During last year, the upper reaches saw stiles put over fences and signs erected at access routes. Anglers use these without noticing them.

The river was also stocked as usual, with the exception that larger-than-normal trout were used to give anglers an opportunity to catch nice fish right away rather than hoping that fingerlings survive long enough to grow to a decent size.

At the meeting, it was stated that grayling stocks in the Clyde are thought to be much better than many of us are aware of.

It was surmised that this could have been due to the three-year period when there was a four-week ban on angling in February and March at a time when grayling were particularly vulnerable in the run-up to their springtime spawning season.

In one of the liveliest AGMs I have known in recent years, topics raised by members from the floor included a fear that too many coloured salmon were being killed in October.

Even the loss of one salmon which is ready to spawn is unacceptable and it was agreed to look into a variety of ways of educating the relatively small number of anglers who are involved, either through lack of knowledge or greed.

Having said that, there is no doubt that the salmon population continues to grow. The gentlemen I was sitting beside told me that they fished with fly last year even when spinning was probably acceptable most of the time.

Enforcing the various laws which should help to govern any river takes up a lot of time and the usual call went out for more volunteers to help in this as well as the more obvious work parties required in fishery management.

Of course, all of us should speak to the anglers around us to gain their support. The vast majority of us already behave properly and I am sure that we can win round the others eventually.