Anglers, Agency and Fish Farmers Meet

The Coarse Fish Meeting

SAA attended a meeting, on the 7th September, of coarse fish farmers at Sparsholt College, Hampshire, organised by Viv Shears, of Sparsholt, and Bernice Brewster of the Coarse Fish Farmers and Traders Association, CFFTA.

Mike Heylin, secretary of SAA, delivered a paper on “ A Buyer’s perception of the coarse fish industry” which generated a lot of debate and produced some useful ideas for future developments in communications between the supply side and customers in fisheries.

Nigel Hewlett, Head of Fish Health at the Environment Agency, brought everyone up to date with the latest news on KHV and the actions the Agency are taking in testing supply site stocks for the disease. The members of the CFFTA are very supportive of the testing programme.

Dr Fiona MacDonald delivered a paper on “Current Disease Issues within the Industry” and Professor Pat Smith a paper on “Fish Vaccines – an option in the future?” Both papers were very interesting and pointed to options in the way forward to fish health issues.

Nigel Hewlett led a laboratory session looking at Cat 2 parasites and how Fish Health checks for Section 30 consents are conducted before participants had the opportunity to do a practical exercise in dissecting and exploring the parasite load of some sample fish.

John Handley of Skretting delivered a paper on “Trout, Carp or Barley?” looking at the relative benefits of various fish feed stuffs and the way in which a mix of feed stuffs could be used to maximise growth rates against inputs, useful information, not only for fish farmers, but also for fishery managers who are bringing on their own stock.

It is hoped that this meeting will be the first of many and that next year the invitation will be extended to angling clubs to send delegates.