Fish & Fly - Jon Beer - 05/98 - The National Trust

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WET BITS OF THE NATIONAL TRUST

Our May 1998 contribution from Jon Beer

Spring being what it is, a chap gets urges. He feels something or other coursing through his veins. What with the sap rising and the trees greening and so forth, he feels quite Robin Hoodsy: he feels like Righting Wrongs and Fighting Injustice.

The National Trust does not, I admit, look an obvious Sheriff of Nottingham, but self serving greed and contempt for the ordinary citizen do not always come wearing a pointy little beard and big black gloves. The National Trust is the biggest landowner in the United Kingdom after the state itself. That also makes it the biggest owner of rivers, lakes, streams and anything else that fish swim in. This package of goodies is owned and preserved by the NT for "the benefit of the nation" which is all very nice for the nation. But the Trust is also charged with promoting "access to and enjoyment of" these national treasure including, one presumes, the watery bits.

So let's see just who has "access to and enjoyment of" the wet bits of the National Trust.

It is not easy to find out. There are sixteen Trust regions in England and Wales: one, the North West Region, owns a fair slice of the Lake District and publishes a single sheet of information on boating and fishing on its many waters. If you want a copy, phone 01539 435 599 and be prepared to wait: this year's is still at the printers. You will wait a lot longer for information from the other fifteen regions. They don't have any. I know: I've tried.

So I began to dig a little deeper. In Northumbria the Trust has water on the Coquet and Wansbeck both let to a private syndicate and on lakes at Crag Lough and Cragside let to private clubs. They also have the River Allen at Allen Banks. I phoned the Trust's agent at that property and asked about the fishing on the Allen. The Trust does not let the fishing, he said, because of the donor's wishes: the Trust, it seems, has principles. This is rubbish: the Trust has owned Allen Banks for half a century and I had just been speaking to a club that had been offered that fishing on the Allen but their tender had not been high enough. The Trust has principles which can be bought if the price is high enough.

These are not isolated exceptions. Many of the great houses and estates had splendid water that you and I had "access to and enjoyment of" through open clubs or day tickets when such places were owned by a practical gentry. The supreme irony is that no sooner do these pass from private owners to the National Trust than the access is closed. At Belton House the Grantham Angling Association had trout fishing on the River Witham and carp in the Lake. Then came the Trust: Grantham Anglers were booted off the lake and river. The lake is now let to a small syndicate on annual membership. Only the staff fish the river. Ripon Anglers once had access to and enjoyment of the lake in Studley Park. The National Trust arrived. The only people who fish it now are National Trust staff and friends.

National Trust staff are the only fishermen on the Abbey Stream, a feeder of the River Test at Mottisfont Abbey. The Trust owns a good stretch of the River Test itself and a tributary. These beats are leased to private individuals or companies. I asked if this was really in the spirit of promoting access to and enjoyment of this national treasure for us plebs. I was told that it was very difficult to terminate such leases some of them were of ten or twelve years. The thing is, the Trust acquired the Abbey in 1957.

And so it goes on. I took to looking in the NT handbook and phoning places at random asking about fishing. Often it was let privately (like the whole of the Sherbourne Brook, a tributary of the Windrush and fished by three friends, including one Jeremy Paxman). On several occasions I was chummily invited to come and fish some lake or stream that no©one but the staff could fish. Which is access of a sort, I suppose.

Look: the Trust holds all this stuff for the benefit of the nation. As far as I am concerned that should mean me. And you. Not just them. The Trust claims to have no central register of their own fishing waters, let alone who has the access to and enjoyment of it. Feeling, as I mentioned earlier, particularly boy scoutsy at the moment, I feel like doing them a Good Turn. But I need help. Your help.

What I need is this. If you know of any National Trust property with water of a fishable nature, send an e-mail, let me know. I am especially interested in any water that is NOT available to a visitor on a day ticket. If you can find out who does have the fishing there, even better. And if you are a member of a club that has lost the fishing on a National Trust property, let me have dates and details and dirt. And when I have garnered this little register of National Trust fishings I will make sure they get it.

Where the sun does not shine.

If you have your own information to add please drop us a line.

Jon Beer contributes regularly to publications including Trout & Salmon and The Telegraph. If you have any comments, do not hesitate to g et in touch or use the message board.