Boat Angling

The weather has been so poor in the last month that we haven’t met up on the pontoons much, so it was nice to get together and chat on Tuesday evening in the Marina Bar.  Steve opened the meeting listing the Club Standings (see below), this was a lot shorter than usual as the season is making a slow start.  It seems to be the Steve Tambling/Richard Pack show so far, and Richard also won the Fish Of The Month for his 14lb Pollack (pictured). Our club funds are very healthy but sadly the SMDAC funds are not looking so good so we have gifted £200 to their kitty. This is also in recognition of all their support and contributions to prize funds previously.

The date for the SMAC and SMDAC BBQ has been set for Saturday 22nd June, serving food from 2pm and the raffle prizes drawn from 4pm. All members and families are welcome. There will be free food, just bring your own drinks and cash for the raffle (because Bill is still watching).  The BBQ location is above the toilet block at the west end of the marina, and I promise it is a lot better than that sounds. This will be our first year without access to the shed so we may have to build a gazebo encampment.

We also had notification of a couple of fundraisers in our neighbouring club. Mick Beatty at the ECA (Mad Mick!) is very poorly and has lost a leg. There is a fundraiser event for him on 20th April  at LHFA. Also at LHFA, our own Michelle Plomer is organising a Blackout Football sweepstake with the South of England Open Championship for Rowan’s Hospice. See Steve Andrews for entry tickets, £5 an entry, pick your own team from the list.

Our next event, the Bream Open Competition is almost on us, to be held on 5th May weather permitting. Details here.

Our new SMAC burgees (pennants) for your boats have arrived. There are two alternative designs, £20 each from Steve Kelly. Don’t be the only one without a club pennant on your boat! Also, summer caps and winter beanies are still available at £10 each (including children’s sizes) while stocks last. These will be for sale at club meetings and events.

Our next monthly meeting will again be at a later date this time due to the May Bank Holiday:  Tuesday 14th May at 7pm in the Marina Bar. Let’s hope for some good fishing weather in the meantime!

We had a special guest at our March SMAC Monthly meeting: Dave Frey, the new manager at Premier Southsea Marina. Dave was invited along to meet and get to know the SMAC folk and also answer any questions from members.

After serving in the police force, Dave joined Premier Marinas first at Brighton then Gosport Marinas before moving to Southsea as Manager. Although there is a lot for him to catch up with at Southsea, Dave was very open to our questions and feedback. He was clearly very sympathetic to some of our issues being a boat owner himself. He explained that there are some company policies he is unable to change however although he is very willing to be a channel for our feedback to Premier.

There are local things that Dave can help with and we were pleased to hear that. He promised to look into the possibility of providing multiple “Lift & Scrub” packages; providing a new shed for our combined use and approaching LHB to see what can be done to remove the obstructions on the point that continue to ambush propellors at dead low water.

Unfortunately, some of our issues will go head-to-head with company policy. The restriction on overnight camper vans is unlikely to be relaxed, nor a time extension for boats on blocks.Although LHB show a reduced rate for harbour dues if paid through a club, this only applies if the club or business administers all the collection of fees. This would be a significant administrative overhead if Premier did this for 315 berth holders, because each one would have to be checked to see if they used the harbour. Liveaboards and boats stored afloat would not require harbour dues if they didn’t go outside the marina. It would probably cost more to do this than the savings would bring, so it isn’t a vaible option unfortunately.

Overall, it was good to meet Dave and I think we all felt it was a beneficial meeting. He is certainly more aware of SMAC now and we all look forward to getting to know him better individually.

Now on to monthly club matters. We all agreed that the Presentation Night on Saturday was a resounding success and the generosity of members with the raffle means we have a very healthy cash tin to support events and continencies. Our next events will be the Open Bream Competition in May, and the SMAC BBQ on a date to be agreed at our next meeting.

There being no fish weighed in during February, the Fish Of The Month Award was transmuted to Neville Of The Month Award. As only one of those was weighed in, he was given the medal in recognition of services rendered.

The SMAC caps and beanies have arrived and are on sale from the Club Shop (which is a grand name for a cardboard box) for £10 each, while stocks last. Kids sizes are available too.

Now that we are all enthused about club merchandise, we agreed to go ahead with the purchase of a small batch of SMAC burgees. These will go on sales at about £20 each. There was interest on both the Richard Pack design and the Bass design. We will be ordering a small quantity of each so everyone will be happy. We hope to have these available by the next meeting.

The next SMAC monthly meeting will be on Tuesday 9th April at 7pm in the Marina Bar.

Our annual Presentation of Awards evening will be held on Saturday 2nd March in the Marina Bar. This is a combined event between SMAC and SMDAC and is always a fun evening. Cups, prizes, certificates and awards will be given to the winners of the 2023 Season competitions. There will be a free drink for each member, free food and a cash raffle with over £500-worth of prizes to be won. Wives and girlfriends are also welcome! Presentations start at 8pm so come along in plenty of time to grab a drink (and a seat) before the ceremonies. This year we will be unveiling the Bill Arnold Memorial Trophy lovingly crafted by his friends and awarded according to Bill’s own wish – although what that actually is will be revealed on the night!

The first SMAC monthly meeting of the 2024 Season is our Annual General Meeting, where we appoint the Committee, update any Club Rules if necessary and generally plan ahead for the next 12 months. There’s quite a lot to report so grab a drink and read on…

First item on the agenda was a bit different – Steve Kelly unveiled the Bill Arnold Memorial Trophy (pictured). This is based on an idea by Bill himself. It includes his own Alvey reel and slabs of oak, with feet made from bronze marine bearings. Peter Kinchin made up the trophy for us, and it will have an engraved plaque when it is presented at our Presentation Night. The actual award is still a secret, so come along to the Presentation and find out!

Our Committee was re-elected with the exception of our late and much missed Treasurer, Bill. Dan Lumsden was voted in as our new Treasurer. Bill was also an awesome seller of raffle tickets, so as Eleanor Atkins was his protégé on the last couple of sales we decided in her absence she would be a worthy successor to the role. See what happens if you don’t attend our AGMs?

The 2024 Committee is as follows:

• Commodore: Tim Andrews
• Chairman: Steve Kelly
• Deputy Chairman: Neville Merritt (+ writer of things and BBQ cook)
• Communications Officer: Steve Andrews
• Treasurer: Dan Lumsden
• Open Competition Organisers: Steve Kelly, Neville Merritt, Dan Lumsden, John Evans
• Raffle Ticket Sales: Eleanor Atkins

There were no requests to change any Club Rules so the existing Rules stand.

Fish Of The Month was awarded to Dan Lumsden for his cod of 10lb 1oz. Richard Pack’s whiting was a smaller % specimen weight and anyway we decided that he had already won enough prizes and cups for that fish (Cod Competition 2^nd Prize and Best Placed SMAC Member cup).

The 2023 Season Results are below – congratulations to all the winners, and Dan Lumsden is our overall Club Champion. We’ll celebrate all these at our joint SMAC and SMDAC Presentation Night on 2^nd March so bring along your partners for a great evening. There will be a free drink for every member, free food and a raffle. We’ll be spending £500 on raffle prizes so it’s worth buying lots of tickets! We will award the cups which live in our Trophy Cabinet, matching awards to keep and Angling Trust Specimen certificates and medals.

Our Club Scales will need officially calibrating if we are to continue to get Specimen Fish Certificates from the Angling Trust, so a calibration fee was authorised. We now have a set of calibration weights for checking too.

Following the interest in our club branded hoodies, polo shirts and the anniversary t-shirts, we had a request for SMAC branded beanies and caps. Neville Merritt showed samples of hats and there was enough interest from members for us to get quotes for a batch of each, to include child sizes as well. If the price is reasonable we’ll buy a stock for sale to members.

Southsea Marina has a new manager – Dave Frey. Dave has been working with Premier since 2016 at other marinas. We agreed to invite him to meet SMAC at the next Monthly Meeting in March, and also to drop into our Presentation Night if he felt so inclined. Hopefully he will be so impressed by our good behaviour that he will look kindly on future requests for SMAC member marina benefits.

Finally, John Wearn laid down the challenge of a SMAC vs. SMDAC competition and we agreed that a summer evening pier competition sounded like a very good idea. A date will be proposed and rules defined.

Our next monthly meeting will be Tuesday 5^th March but don’t forget, our Presentation Night is the previous Saturday evening on 2^nd March. See you there!