Jesus walking on the water may be a contributory factor.

 

Have you been on that damson gin again?

 

No but there's a few tarts.

 

After just 5 short posts, I'm beginning to see why the clergy may have abandoned the world of angling!

 

There once was a vicar from Kew
who knelt with his vestments askew
when a lady called Morgan
caught sight of his organ
she promptly passed out in the pew

 

Gently shifting the mood from silly to morbid,- there is a memorial stone to a fishing clergyman who very sadly drowned in Llyn Berwyn in the mid-90s.id understand if his successor gave it a pass

 

My Father-in-Law, the Reverend Dr Ted Lurkings, was a hugely enthusiastic fly fisher. He was also a keen shot and a founder member of CAMRA. When he retired they moved to Abercych, to a house beautifully positioned opposite a pub and close to the banks of the Teifi. A great man . . . and his daughter’s OK too.

 

The secretary of my local Chalk stream until recently was a man of the cloth... and one of my other clubs has a retired Archdeacon on the committee . So yes they do .

O M W

 

Given the drastic decline in fish numbers, they're probably waiting for another miracle.

 

I know two that fish

 

Members on here, Revo I think he’s a reverend. I remember watching an old black and white film years ago it was an old Margaret Rutherford type of thing, and the old village vicar was obsessed with catching a wily old trout in his local river. He did actually hook it after weeks of trying, pity they stopped showing these old films, I suppose today’s youth wouldn’t be interested.
S.

 

A nice old bit of footage here of Oliver Kite fishing with one of his ecclesiastical friends. I love the bit where he nips off to carry out a wedding ceremony, then comes back to fish again!

 

Some years ago on a Riverfly training day I met the angling vicar of a small dales town. He was a pleasant enough chap though a bit bland; think of a younger version of J R Hartley.
B

 

At the last committee meeting our retired Archdeacon member had been carrying out an exorcism that day , When we expressed surprise he said that people are increasingly messing with the occult , Yes he was serious. beleive it or not he confirmed that it is causing still problems...

O M W

 

Indeed. As William Shakespeare put it; There are more things in Heaven and Earth, Horatio, than are dreamt of in your philosophy. I've seen enough over the years to know that there are phenomena we still don't understand, and which shouldn't be trifled with.

 

Here is one from my Bookshelf
View attachment 128573

 

The number of active clergy in the UK has halved in the last 25 years (not sure how to interpret ‘active’). So the number fly fishing is likely to have fallen.

There is a fishing syndicate on our river called the Medics and Clerics. I’ve only bumped into a couple of members, but I assumed from the torrent of foul language, both were retired doctors 😁

 

The number of active clergy in the UK has halved in the last 25 years (not sure how to interpret ‘active’). So the number fly fishing is likely to have fallen.

😁

add in to this that an increasing proportion of the clergy are female and the number of female fly fishers is relatively small. Could this be a conspiracy?

 

One of my favourite angling books is 'Orange Otter, by Christopher Knowles, (2006), which details the life and angling exploits of the Reverend Edward Powell, Vicar of Munslow in Shropshire and inventor of the Orange Otter, one of around 26 of his own dressings.

Powell mostly fished Shropshire's Corve and Onny and was a great pursuer of trout on those streams with the dry fly, and he was somewhat contemptuous of the focus placed upon the Southern chalkstream style of dry fly fishing which punctuated the angling press at his time. He was a follower and admirer of the legendary Teifi 'Master', Dai Lewis of Tregaron.
Another favoured book of mine is 'Here and There a Lusty Trout' (1947), written, by T A Powell, Edward Powell's brother, the dedication in his book is . . .

To my brother, 'Willow' in Game
& Gun and in the Country Sports-
man, my mentor for forty years.

 

There's also Norman McLean's (author of 'A River Runs Throught It') father who was a Presbyterian minister and apparently an excellent fly fisherman who taught his sons to become accomplished fly fishermen!

 

Think the only dog collar you’re likely to see on the bank now is probably left over from a chavs pit-bull 😂

 

Early writing describing the first ‘dapping’ of sorts was often done by Monks for food, they also stocked numerous bodies of water with fish, including the high lakes of Wales with carp for food. Maybe that’s where the link is.?


Historical Evidence:
A Benedictine monk in Bavaria, Germany, wrote the "Tegernsee Fishing Advice" manuscript in the late 15th century, containing notes on fly fishing techniques, including making artificial flies. Additionally, a fishing hut was built at the Cong Abbey in Ireland, which had a trapdoor for keeping fish fresh and a line to the kitchen, suggesting monastic involvement in fishing for food

 

I can't speak for present day, but when I first started flyfishing many years ago as a teenager under the tutelage of my uncle, one of our constant companions was a Reverend.

 

Back in the late 1970's I was privileged to know what was probably the last of the Edwardian huntin', shootin' and fishin' vicars. His name was Reverend Edward Alston. He had an amazing collection of cased fish most of which he had caught himself. He was also at that time the holder of both the Tench and Rudd records and was one of the only anglers in this country to have caught a burbot on rod & line. I was put in touch with him by the late Richard Walker.

He lived in an apartment in a big house on the outskirts of Warminster and this is now an upmarket hotel. My wife and I have lunch there in the first week of a new year.

 

what happened to the cased fish?