First Polish Angling Club Formed in Scotland
The SFCA are delighted to be able to announce the formation of the first Polish Angling Club in Scotland. The club aims to promote ‘catch and release’ fishing and hopes to join the SFCA as a full member club in April 2013. The majority of the club’s members have already joined the SFCA as Individual Members.
President of the club, Maciej Kowalkowski said, “The Polish Angling Club was established at the end of 2011. Our goal is to integrate and initiate contacts with the Scottish anglers, organizing competitions and the events. We want to educate the Polish Anglers in matters such as laws and normal practice concerning fishing on Scottish waters. We promote the principle of Catch & Release and try to convince others to do so. We realize that we are not here at home … we are guests here and we have an obligation to adapt to the existing laws and regulations here. Unfortunately, not everyone realizes that every fishery in Scotland has separate legislation, so we try to provide information on our website about where anglers can fish and how. Our club is a non-profit organization and has the status of a sports club and is subject to all the laws and regulations in force in Scotland.
We also work with other clubs, anglers, the services administrators and organizations. These include: the SFCA, Big Fish – Ireland club from Northern Ireland, Upper Avon Angling Association, Angling Trust, PikeHunter Team, Fish Hunter etc. We hope that this cooperation will pay off in the future and we will continue to expand our contacts.
On his own initiative a friendly local angler, Stan Broom, has also managed to create a Scottish / Polish fishing group on facebook whose main goal is integration, the eradication of cultural stereotypes and, of course, joint meetings on the water.
We hope that the association and cooperation with the SFCA will help to achieve our aims, be mutually beneficial and that the image of Polish fishermen will be better than before.
For more information, please visit our website – www.fishermann.pl
President: Maciej Kowalkowski – rivan2@wp.pl
Vicepresident: Przemyslaw Waclawski – onelll@wp.pl“
To read this statement in Polish click the link below:
Polski Fishermann Angling Club
SFCA Chairman Gus Brindle said, “I have for some time been concerned about the level of anti eastern European rhetoric on some of the forums – mainly fueled by the ‘pot hunting’ activity of some anglers who do not share our ethos of catch and release. At the same time I was acutely aware that in Scotland we don’t do anything as a Governing Body to communicate with, or educate, these anglers and we were in fact failing both sides. For this reason the SFCA had already been in contact with Polish anglers working with the Angling Trust in England. The aim was to share best practice and produce some multi lingual signs and media to promote catch and release, and to educate anglers from eastern Europe about our laws and culture. SFCA members will be aware that we have in fact managed to secure some funding from Marine Scotland to progress this work. Irrespective at how much money your raise, or how many signs you erect or leaflets your print however, you cannot beat having the message communicated to individuals in their own language by their peers or other anglers of their own nationality. For this reason I believe the formation of this new club represents a landmark for Scottish coarse angling. I have recently met with Maciej Kowalkowski and Przemyslaw Waclawski and was impressed with what they said and with their desire to improve the image of Polish anglers. I wish them, and their members, the best of luck in developing their club and am looking forward to working, and indeed fishing with them in the near future.
I am now hopeful that anglers from other nations will perhaps see what can be achieved and form their own clubs or join us as individual members.”
Tags: Membership
