News

Dear Members,

We are writing to inform you of an important change regarding Decoy Pond and the club’s waters.

Following ongoing delays and difficulties in reaching a formal agreement with the Council, Paxmans Angling Club has taken the decision to withdraw from Decoy Pond with immediate effect. This means that Decoy Pond will no longer be a Paxmans Angling Club water.

This decision has not been taken lightly. We have spent a considerable amount of time trying to reach an agreement that would allow us to formally take responsibility for the water, improve its condition and manage it properly. Unfortunately, the continued uncertainty around the arrangement has left the club in a position where we have been associated with a water without having the level of control or authority that we believe is necessary.

Recent events have also highlighted the vulnerability of the club when it is associated with a water without having a formal lease, clear responsibilities and the ability to properly control and manage the site. This creates risks for the club and its committee, both in terms of safety and liability, but also in terms of the club’s reputation.

We have also suffered from a poor public perception of Decoy Pond for a number of years because of its condition, despite the fact that many of the issues have been outside the club’s control. We cannot continue to carry that reputation while being unable to properly address the underlying problems.

We appreciate that this decision comes part-way through the current membership year and that, for some members, this will mean losing access to a water that they have paid for.

Members who hold a Decoy-only ticket will therefore be offered a pro-rata refund for the unused portion of their membership. We will contact those members directly regarding the refund arrangements.

For members who have Decoy included as part of their wider club membership, we recognise that this represents a reduction in the number of waters available to you for the remainder of the current season. We appreciate your understanding while we deal with the situation.

We also want to clarify an important point regarding membership fees for the 2027/28 season.

We had previously planned to increase membership prices for 2027/28 in response to the continued increase in the costs of running and maintaining the club and its waters. Those planned increases will now NOT be implemented.

The loss of Decoy Pond means that we will maintain our existing membership pricing for the 2027/28 season. We feel this is the fairest approach given the reduction in the number of waters available to members.

We are disappointed that we have reached this position after putting so much time and effort into trying to secure the future of Decoy Pond. However, we believe that stepping away is now the responsible decision for the club, its members and the committee.

Our focus will remain on managing and improving our remaining waters and ensuring that Paxmans Angling Club continues to provide safe, well-managed and sustainable fishing for its members.

Thank you for your continued support and understanding.

Paxmans Angling Club Committe

The committee would like to address the rumours of otters on Home Farm, that you may have heard. We believe in being transparent with the membership so here are the facts.

We have recovered 5 dead fish, 3 Carp to low-doubles and 2 small Catfish, the Carp especially did appear to be typical of otter kills. One further catfish of just over 30lbs has been caught with some fresh damage that could be due to an otter attack.

In terms of timeline, these were all recovered within a ~2 week window, for the past ~4 weeks there have been no further signs of dead fish, otter movements or sightings. We are using wildlife cameras and other detection methods to held us gain evidence as to whether they are still present (we believe not), and/or alert us if they return.

As it stands, we believe that this was likely a young male otter, passing through trying to find its own territory. The kills were not frequent enough, or scalable enough in our opinion to support a family or breeding pair of otters.

As I’m sure you can imagine the prospect of fencing this venue is daunting, in terms of finances, logistics. We are looking into options including part fencing, deterrents in terms of electric fencing in some areas and full-scale fencing, however we are monitoring the situation and will not be making any rash decisions.

Whilst it is hard to have seen, the number of fish lost is extremely low, and all the evidence suggests that the otter may now have moved on, so we’ll continue to gather evidence as described above and react accordingly.

Any questions please let us know.

Many thanks,

Paxmans Angling Club Committee

1st April means the renewal period has started. All the stationery is in both tackle shops, Clacton Angling and Elmstead Fishing Tackle, and they can renew your membership for you. Please remember you have to take your membership card with you, and cash or cheque, no paying by card.

If you need any changes to your card, address or catagory, the tackle shops are not able to do the changes. You will need to send off your card, payment and an SAE to the secretary. A change of category will also probably need another up to date photo.

Lastly, if you don’t have a night permit at the moment, please don’t ask for one when you renew. You will need to contact the Secretary to be added to the waiting list for one. We will know after the 1st June how many night permits we have available to allocate.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 
 

 
 
 

 

 
 

 

 
 
 

 

 
 

 
 

 

 

 

A copy of the AGM Presentation for those that did not attend.

This season’s newsletter will be going out very shortly, so if you have changed your address and not informed the Secretary, can you do so as soon as possible please.  Thank you.