Abbey Lake covers an area of roughly 3.6 acres. Every spring fish are removed from the lake to reduce the numbers as there is no other means of escape for them. In 2018 there was a successful fish reduction and this year it was hoped to reduce the current population by about 200 lbs to promote a healthy population.
Common and Mirror Carp are the predominant species within the lake, and when left unchecked these populations tend to increase steadily due to favourable breeding conditions and few natural predators, e.g. otters, cormorants. Once the population gets too large it is a temptation for illegal fishing but moreover it becomes unsustainable in the shallow lake, causing health problems for the fish, food shortages, depleted oxygen levels (particularly in the summer months) and sadly results in numbers of fish dying off, which is both unsightly and malodorous.
Images of some of the fish that have been seen in Abbey Fields Lake can be seen if you click here This will open in a new tab.
Why are the fish in Abbey Fields Gulping Air?
In time of hot weather we often receive a number of messages from people who are worried about the fish in Abbey Fields especially when they see them apparently gulping for air.
Friends of Abbey Fields have checked with Warwick District Council who have responsibility for the management of all of the features of Abbey Fields and they have advised that they work with professional organisations that help us manage the lake, especially The Environment Agency and Leamington Angling.
The fish stocks are managed by removing as many fish as possible in late winter, (the lake is not stocked) and the removed fish are rehomed in local waters all under licence. This has been done for numbers of years, to everyone’s benefit, and they have not experienced a fish kill since the lake was dug.
After a number of calls to the Environment Agency from members of the public, they came out and checked the water quality, which means they check dissolved oxygen in the water the fish breath, and for pollutants. In the hottest part of last year the levels of oxygen were all fine and no pollutants found on the several times the checks were made.
Leamington Angling were also asked to inspect the lake. They found the fish to be healthy and observed fish sucking invertebrates off the surface of the water, this, in their words, could be construed as fish gasping for air. The fishes were fed some carp food and were feeding happily.
As a final note the lake water levels are managed by the Environment Agency under licence who dictate the level which water is taken form the brook into the lake. There is a permanent level which prevents water flowing into the lake when levels in the stream drop. When we are in drought conditions no water flows into the lake. This was part of the design for the lake and was a planning constraint on the lakes construction /design.
As an observation, it is interesting to note that the fish are not stocked which indicates that they are surviving and breeding successfully and this would not happen if there were problems with oxygen levels or pollutants.
Fish removal Wednesday 13 Feb 2019
On Wednesday 13th February, 2019, Countryside Management students from Moreton Morrell College came to Abbey Fields to help remove some of the fish from Abbey Lake under the direction of Fisheries Manager Jon Wall and Anthony Simmons from Leamington Angling Association.
The fish were carefully removed by Seine netting, and transported to John Wall Fisheries, Melton Mowbray, in oxygenated 1 m3 tanks. Once there, the fish were to be sorted, health-checked, fed and prepared for distribution to restock ponds, lakes and pools in the area and potentially across the UK
This year, Jon Wall had brought a fish finder to see if the location of the fish shoals could be determined before laying out the nets. Unfortunately the shallowness of the water prevented a great deal of success and as a result the team had to complete two trawls with the seine nets.
Submerged branches from last year’s tree damage caused some issues with net retrieval.
A surprising number of visitors took interest in proceedings and we fielded questions whenever possible, in order to let everyone know what was going on.
Please click on the images for larger versions.
| Photographs by David Emsley