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Since starting on Yateley I have been very interested in the history of the fish. After fishing the other side of the road I and a lot of other regulars were interested as to the circumstances in which the majority of the Car Park fish were originally moved. With some investigation and Photographic evidence from Chris Ball ,the countries leading Carp Historian, we can now show the years and weights of some of these fish at the time of their movement, or as near as. More of Chris's photos from the match lake days will appear shortly in the Historic gallery. Many thanks to Chris for sharing these with us.
The photo on the left shows Chunkys' capture at 22lb 4oz in 1982 from the match lake by Jan Wenczka. After this capture she was moved into the Car Park Lake, a short trip across the road. 20 Years later and she is now weighing around 42lb 8oz as shown below with Richard Spencer a couple of years ago. As you can see she looks almost younger now then she did then, a testament to the extreme care taken by the anglers fortunate to catch her.
Two years later on the 10th of September 1984 the Big Orange was caught by Chris at 19lb 4oz from the jungle. Shortly after she made the same journey as Chunky and now represents the most infrequently caught fish in the Car Park, uncaught so far during the 2002/2003 season. She is shown on the right with Chris Ball at 19lb 4oz on the 10th September 1994. It was nearly 17 Years to the day on 11th September 2001 she was caught by Si Croft at just over 44lb after evading capture for over 2 years.
A fish we previously believed to have come from the same source as Single some years before the Match Lake Fish. However we now have a photo of Pearly with Chris caught from the Match at 20lb 4oz in 1980. She is shown on the left at the time of that capture with Chris and below with Rasher Claridge at 37lb+ in 2001.
We know this fish came over from the match lake and sustained the tail damage that gave the fish its name during transit. We hope to bring you photos of Arfur at the time of movement of this shortly. I was lucky enough to bank her in 2001 at 51lb.
Until passing away last year Single was possibly the longest living resident of the Car Park. Single was seen by Chris Ball and other anglers at the time of the Bronze Leather, the Big Common and Kenny Hodders fish. Single possibly came from Sutton at the same time as Bazil but that is only speculation.
The Bronze leather, originally known as the male leather unfortunately died after a capture, and the big common has since died, A photo of the Bronze leather is shown on the left. Kenny Hodders fish was caught at a spawn bound 42lb in October 1979 but died shortly afterwards prpbably due to its condition.
We believe all are Match Lake refugees, although we don't currently have any details of their match lake captures.
SF
