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BAFAC Presentation Evening 2008
Barnton & Frodsham A.C. held their annual presentation night on April 18th 2008 and the event was a great success. The trophies were kindly presented by Barnton’s Community Police Officer, Diana Wiggins and afterwards the entertainment was provided by local duo, Voyage.
Junior Prize-winners
8-12 years
 Shane Bellis Early Season Series 1st Place
(3 firsts and a second for 46 points) Pymer Cup
Summer Series 1st Place
(2 firsts and 2 seconds) Summer Series Trophy
 Gareth Evans Early Season Series 2nd Place
(A first and 3 seconds for 42 points)
Hyland Trophy
Summer Series 3rd Place
(2 seconds and 2 thirds for 36 points)
Roberts Bakery Cup
 Luke Ormond Summer Series 2nd Place
(3 firsts and a fourth for 42 points)
J.Hayes Memorial Cup
Siobhan Finney Early Season Series 3rd Place (34pts)
(A second and 3 thirds for 34 points) Small Junior Trophy
 Joe Hunt Christmas Match (weight 1-13-8)
Large Xmas Shield
13-16 years
 Stephen Finney Early Season Series 1st Place
(A first, 2 seconds and a third for 40points)
Dr O’Sullivan Cup
Summer Series 3rd Place
(A first and 3 seconds for 42 points)
Junior Club Cup
Christmas Match (1-15-8) Small Xmas Shield
 Martin Saunders Early Season Series 2nd Place
(2 firsts, a second and a third for 42 points) Manfredi Trophy
Summer Series 2nd Place (42pts)
(On superior aggregate weight with 2 firsts, a second and a third for 42 points)
Bob Hunt Memorial Cup
 Michael Chung Early Season Series 1st Place (46pts)
(3 firsts and a second for 46 points)
Summer Shield
Largest Fish in a Match (carp 7-3-0)
Billy Mutch Memorial Cup
 Nathan Robinson Early Season Series 3rd Place (28pts)
(A first, 2 thirds and a fifth for 28 points) Small Junior Trophy
 Carl Bellis Winner of the Junior C&P Match C&P Trophy
SENIOR WINNERS
 
 
 
CHARITABLE MATCHMEN WITH DEEP POCKETS
The club’s matchmen have recorded a fine achievement other than in the fish catching department. They have for a number of years raised a good deal of money for St Luke’s Hospice and Macmillan Nurses through the charity matches that have been run on the river and at Heesom’s pool. A more recent innovation has been the raffles that take place at each match which has seen other local charities benefit from the fund raising efforts.
Two other hospices have received donations, Halton Haven at Runcorn and St Rocco’s at Warrington. A donation has gone towards the fund raising efforts for the building of a new village hall in Whitley. There has also been club a contribution to a fund to help the seriously ill child of a local policeman.
In total between November 2007 and October 2008, the club has handed over a total of £817.50 to these worthy causes with more soon to follow, a record the club and more particularly its matchmen can be singularly proud!
Below is an email I received from from the Platt family along with a couple more pics of their very talented daughter (not forgetting you as well Sam). Not only is the web site becoming famous but celebrities are also visiting the Junior pit. Despite all of the rain you are getting back in the UK it doesn’t seem to be putting the fishing off on the Clubs waters, in fact I am thinking of trying to find a cheap flight back there.
Ruddyroach/Eduardo
“Hi More photos, Sophie caught these along with 24 rudd and roach from juniors, funny thing was that as we walked to the bank we had a quick chat with the one and only David Dimbleby (question time host) who was on a boating holiday so its amazing who you meet when a member of Bafac !”
 
SOGGY WEATHER PUTS A DAMPER ON SPORT
The wettest opening few weeks of any fishing season I can remember has slowed sport after the usual frenetic start. The river has been charging through at a tremendous lick almost constantly since the opening day with the result that few people have bothered to fish it. Matchmen have enjoyed a certain degree of success resorting to conventional feeder a pole feeder tactics to find some fish out of the main flow. On the couple of occasions when the river flow has slowed enough to allow pole fishing, a couple of our members have found that there appear to be plenty of chub about with Ian Fewtrell contacting specimens in the two to three pound bracket.
There are still decent bags of tench and crucians along with skimmers to be had in the junior and middle pools at Anderton with pellet, meat corn and bread on the hook but roach and rudd are increasingly turning on to these baits with even the odd gudgeon snaffling them. As well as the usual carp into double figures the boilie men are getting decent tench to five pounds. Large hair rigged halibut pellet presented on leger rigs are also tempting the tench and carp.
 
Mike Hagan displays a 5 pound A typical 8 pound 2 ounce Junior pool
Tench caught in the Junior Cistern carp
Carp are being taken on surface and bottom baits in the top pool with plenty of rudd and roach to maggot for those who prefer the smaller species.
Judging by the match results Heesom’s pool is still providing good sport. Keep an eye on the match reports for here and the river to discover the scoring methods.
Longton’s pool yielded a ten pound carp to Dave Hessom, a guest angler and although I haven’t anything about Eden’s pool this year, it will almost certainly produce good bags of small fish for the pleasure angler fishing with maggots with perhaps the odd crucian or tench thrown in. The only other comment that I can add is, if the last three weeks are anything to go by, don’t forget your fishing umbrella!
So Where Were You?
Now I realise many of you lead busy lives and everyone forgets to do things that they meant to do BUT despite a membership of 300+, the working party at Anderton which had been publicised in both the newsletter on this website, managed to attract a pathetic7 bodies to undertake the urgent work on the pools.
Ron Garner, Pete Wilkinson, Calvin Tagg, John Morrison, Ian Morrison, Pat Colgan and I were the conscientious participants. These few however, worked like Trojans to get the most important tasks completed and one or two others well underway. The main order of the day was to haul out the numerous twigs and branches that had been blown into the Junior Pool during the strong winds last winter. Ron Garner’s amphibious act in a pair of chest waders made this task considerably easier and in a surprisingly short time, the worst of the offending tree limbs were removed although I wouldn’t claim that we have managed to remove every one. One very large bough couldn’t be removed due to its weight so this was floated down the pool and secured beneath an overhanging willow where it was impossible to fish anyway. That job done a little branch trimming was undertaken to make casting easier from some pegs. Ron and Pat then started on the repair of a two peg frontages while the rest of us moved up to the other cisterns.
While Ian and Calvin ran the weed saw through the top pool, John and I set about repairing a small but deep hole in the bank of the middle pool. This had the potential to seriously injure the unwary. It took in the region of twenty bricks to fill the hole before it could be levelled up with stony soil.
The weed saw did a good job but time/manpower constraints meant the job couldn’t be fully completed. However the growth should be checked for a while. Some litter was collected from all the pools but thankfully there was not very much in evidence. So that’s where we are at the moment. We hope to do some further branch trimming in the senior cisterns and a bit more water weed removal. Come the season though, if you find yourself in a weedy swim or your access to a favourite peg is somewhat restricted, please don’t moan about it because with a little more help from a few more of you the work could have been done.
POSH NEW PEGS ON THE RIVER
Matchmen and pleasure anglers alike will be delighted to find that pegs 30 to 62 have been refurbished to a high standard on our stretch of the Weaver at Anderton. The improvements have been made by the Countryside Management department of the local authority. Bridges have been built across the pipelines where appropriate and new steps with handrails lead down to stoned pitches on the river bank. In addition the footpath along the stretch has been resurfaced.
The Head Ranger has asked that members do not travel between pegs along the riverbank but use the steps and upper path to gain access. Your co-operation in this matter would be greatly appreciated. We would like to thank everybody involved in the planning and execution of the work which will make life much easier for club members wishing to fish the river.
 
The pictures give a good idea of the greatly improved access to the pegs
Net Dip at Heesom’s Pool:
To protect our fish stock, (and acting on advice from our Fisheries Adviser and the Environment Agency), the Committee decided in October 2005 that the net dip at Heesom’s Pool will remain in place permanently and so the following procedure has been put in place:
All anglers fishing at the Pool must always dip all of their nets and/or un-hooking mats in the disinfectant tank provided and rinse them in the adjacent water tanks before they commence fishing.
Furthermore, - (to remove the risk of a young child climbing into the dip tank when there is no adult present) - anglers must always chain and lock the tanks after they have dipped their nets and before they go to their peg.
Numerous signs detailing this procedure are in place at the Pool but there have already been indications that some individuals have not followed it. The level of bailiffing at Heesom’s Pool will be increased, therefore, and the Committee will take action against any member who does not abide by this procedure. If this problem continues at a significant level, consideration will have to be given to other options to safeguard the fish stocks in the Pool.
Use of more than two rods:
There have been incidents of individuals using more than two rods whilst fishing on our waters during 2005. I take this opportunity to remind members that Rule 23 states that ‘The maximum number of rods for pleasure fishing will be two rods in use at any one time.’ This applies irrespective of the number of current Environment Agency Rod Licenses an individual may hold.
Litter:
The amount of litter left by anglers around the Club’s fisheries reached unacceptable levels on occasions during the last year. Not only does this practice attract vermin, it can also lead to the Club losing the fishing rights on the waters it rents.
Rule 17 specifies that ‘any existing litter must be removed before commencement of fishing and pegs must be left Litter Free’. Those who disregard this risk having their membership of the Club terminated.
Fisheries Development Planning
With the club’s continued commitment to improving our fisheries for the benefit of all our members, a Fisheries Development discussion group has been formed. The group includes our Fisheries Adviser Stan Atkinson who has a wealth of experience in fish stocking policy with many contacts within the industry.
The remit of the group will be to formulate a stocking plan for each of our waters, as well as Heesom’s Pool. At the moment possibilities for the provision of suitable spawning areas at Heesom’s Pool are being considered with the aim of eventually achieving annual fry recruitment of most species. It is hoped that we can also provide refuges to protect our existing stocks from cormorant predation.
In the not too distant future it is hoped that the application of the development plans will realise the full potential of our venues leading to highly productive fisheries that will satisfy matchman, specimen hunter and pleasure angler alike.
 The first consignment of stock fish since the group was formed were received in February with over a thousand true Crucian carp and around 150 tench went into Heesom’s Pool. In addition, half a dozen tench and a small number of Crucians were placed into Eden’s pool. It is hoped that these fish will provide the nucleus of a breeding stock that will provide more variety on this small water.
A second consignment of fish was stocked towards the end of March. This time the fish were mainly bream to around 3 pounds plus some roach and roach/bream hybrids. These fish were netted from the Wildfowl Trust’s lakes at Martin Mere and transferred directly to Heesom’s Pool. The bream will bridge the size gap between the old large bream originally stocked in the pool many years ago and the recent stockings of skimmers. This completes the planned stocking for this year.
 
 
Personal Liability Insurance Cover for all Senior Members
The Committee has taken out a Personal Liability Insurance Policy with Mead Sports & LeisureLtd. This provides cover for every Senior memberof the Club, (i.e. those over 16 years of age) in the event that the member faces a legal claim because he or she:
- Causes accidental bodily injury to any other person while fishing anywhere in the United Kingdom
- Causes accidental loss or damage to property not belonging to nor in the custody or control of the Club member whilst fishing anywhere in the UK.
- Please also note that:
- The maximum amount payable in respect of a claim due to an accident caused by a Senior member is £100,000.
- The first £250 of each claim in respect to damage to a 3rd Party’s property is not covered.
- For full details of the Terms and Conditions of this policy, contact John Morrison, (his telephone number is in the Club Handbook).
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