Boat Angling

Tonight we drank a toast to the memory of a dear friend and SMAC member, Bill Arnold who passed away last week. Bill was a huge supporter of the club and did a lot of practical work behind the scenes to help. He was a regular contributor at our meetings, a fearsome seller of raffle tickets and of course a very competitive angler. We will miss him terribly.

To recognise his contribution to the club, there is a proposal to create a new prize which will be announced at the Presentation Night. Bill himself had the idea for both the award and the construction of the prize itself, so it will be nice to see it all come together.

We had a great turnout to the meeting and there was a lot to talk about. The Club Standings are listed below – Dan Lumsden leads (by one point) the Species Competition, the Bass Cup has changed hands and we have a new leader in the Cod Pool. It’s all still happening! The Bass Season remains open until the end of the SMAC year now, so there will be no early finishes.

Fish Of The Month was awarded to the larger of two cod entered, Tony Skinner’s cod of 8lb 5oz.

The Open Cod Competition still hasn’t happened due to the weather, and if it is postponed again on 10^th the next possible Sunday (due to committee availability, Christmas and New Year) will be 7^th January.

We have had very positive messages of support from Premier Marinas so we are hopeful that this will extend to more storage facilities and other practical measures. In turn, SMAC will continue to attract new members and new berth holders for them!

The Mandela Cup competition will be held on Saturday 30^th December, to be followed by our traditional annual curry. This time it will be at one of the Albert Road establishments in Southsea. Details and a poll of members intending to go will be circulated separately.

Our Presentation Night will be held on Saturday 2^nd March in the Marina Bar. This year the cost of glass prize replicas has increased considerably, so instead we will be giving out vouchers from our two main tackle shop sponsors, Fish-On and Cosham Angling.

The January meeting will be held a week later than normal due to New Year, so we’ll see you on 9^th January 2024.

Our stalwart members have got used to the cold dark evenings and this month turned out in force to support the SMAC get-together in the Marina Bar. John Wearn kept us supplied with chewy sweets while we waited for the formalities to begin. Steve put the finishing touches to his paperwork, last meal orders were put in, drinks topped up and we were off.

First item was a review of the club competition standings, which you can read below. Then came Fish Of The Month, and because of the recent weather the list was very short. I was surprised there were any, given the severity of the storms. Nevertheless, we had a vote and the top specimen was a 10lb 2oz Bull Huss earning Mick Beatty a medal and a tenner.

The Cod Pool is still open and currently stands at £320. The only cod entered so far is a very junior 3lb something so if you haven’t put your money down, hurry up because that next cod could be worth a lot.

The last order of our Anniversary t-shirts has now been distributed, and thanks to all the members that supported this.

A quick update on The Shed Saga, Episode 4. The original shed used by SMAC members has now gone back to Premier for re-letting. The number of members wanting shed space puts the total requirement outside the scope of what SMAC funds can cover, so we recommend that those members who want to combine forces to share a shed with freezer space do so without involving SMAC. We have been promised “something” by Premier for the limited club requirements but unfortunately this won’t cover the wider needs of individual members.

The Cod Open Competition will roll on from Sunday to Sunday until we have a suitable weather window.

The Nelson Mandela Cup (a SMAC event) is traditionally held in that quiet period between Christmas and New Year when our families want rid of us and this year will be held on 30^th December. We will fish 8am to 2pm, with plenty of bar time afterwards. Largest cod or if no cod largest whiting will win.

Rumours abound regarding frozen squid availability, but there are some in 1Kg boxes in the marina office freezer for £12 a box.

Club funds stand at a healthy £2,302.29 which means we can have a very jolly Presentation Night. This will be on 2^nd March 2024 in the Marina Bar. Families welcome, there will be a free drink for members and a free buffet. There will be a presentation of cups if we can get the prize cabinet open. Steve has accidently thrown the keys away – does anyone know a locksmith? Otherwise we will just have to point to them instead of giving them, which could make the award photographs a little awkward.

Next meeting will be on Tuesday 5^th December. Nobody has mentioned Winter Bar Times so far so unless you hear otherwise it will be 7pm as usual.

Evenings are drawing in and Portsmouth were playing at home so perhaps that’s why we had just a few of our core supporters at the meeting. OK, so some people had Covid and others had to work, but those are pretty poor excuses. Anyway, with our small but merry band we quickly proceeded with our agenda so some of us could go over to the ECA for the Langstone Harbour Meeting, more of that later.

Steve went through the current standings which are reproduced below. The Species Hunt Cup leadership is changing daily because the top three (at least) are very close. Do remember to photograph your fish before throwing it back though.

There were several eligible catches for the Fish Of The Month medal, but in the end the important decision was which fish would Steve Tambling win with and we decided a turbot of 7lb 9oz was the best candidate.

The Cod Pool stands at £240 so if you haven’t paid, get your £10 to Steve before you catch that winning cod. You can’t pay afterwards!

The Inter-Club competition will be hosted by LHFA this Sunday 8^th October, but you can sign in at the Southsea Marina Office. £5 entry, winner takes all for Best Specimen.

The Cod Open is most likely to be held on Sunday 5^th November, weather permitting.  Hold the date and more details to follow, but it’s highly likely to be exactly the same as all the other years we have run it.

The last order for our 10-Year Anniversary printed t-shirts and polo shirts is being put together, so if you don’t want to miss out please order on this form before 9^th October.

Finally – an update on the shed which we have used for storage. As the tenant who allowed us to use the shed is leaving the marina, we urgently need alternative storage. Premier have asked us what space we need so Steve, Stuart and I will put together a request for Premier to consider.

The next SMAC monthly meeting will be on 7^th November. There being no other business, a few of the few nipped over to the ECA for the advertised Langstone Harbour Advisory Board meeting. Just quickly on that, because it’s not SMAC business really but it is relevant. As we hadn’t read the leaflet properly it wasn’t quite what we were expecting. Anyway, it was interesting and the bar was rammed with mostly sailing and environmental folk. There were four presentations from different organisations each with an interest in the Harbour.

First up was Solent Seascape Project, with some decent funding and can actually demonstrate some practical results in improving the marine environment – oyster beds, seagrass, kelp beds etc.  The Trawler-Free Zone on the Sussex coast shows that the seabed recovers surprisingly quickly. The Clean Harbours Partnership presentation was about monitoring storm discharges by the water companies and didn’t seem to have much in the way of practical proposals to be honest. We are all frustrated by the lack of direct Govenment intervention on this.

Langstone Harbour Board’s message was about the future use of the Harbour and supporting commercial use, leisure use and environmental protection. We know from the Annual Report there is a huge deficit in their budget, mainly because of the drop in revenue from dredgers and leisure use. They are currently exploring more ways of increasing revenue, some being commercial services but others being considered include walk-ashore moorings instead of swinging moorings. It’s good that they are trying to fill the funding gap rather than waiting for the Council to make them cut costs. Final presentation was from Fay Pasani of the RSPB who is acting for the Three Harbours Partnership. She has the probably impossible job of aligning 20 stakeholder organisations into a common strategy. This did appear vague at present but the intention is good – to have multiple partnerships with a common goal rather than the separate, conflicting and overlapping activities that are happening at present. Her presentation style reminded me of Sarah Pascoe which was a nice thought to end on.

Thank you ECA for hosting another interesting evening.