Ok whats the worst thing thats happened to you in fishing ?
I will start it off
I went to southern France to a Lake when I arrived the owner said well looks like your the only one this week so if you want to use my rowing boat ? so I spent half the day with a prodding pole and found a really great spot well over halfway across the lake but as I had a baitboat and their was shade this side and none the other I decided to not get baked and my plan was dump 10kg of bait in so I rowed out and scattered it over this lovely spot and got set up I had a few liners in the night and in the morning fish began head and shouldering over the area I was so excited
AND THEN !!! FOUR ANGLERS ARRIVED!!!!! they saw the fish and lots of excitement as they unloaded and quickly set up it was just an 80 yard cast for them but a 170 yard for me so I had no choice they all caught withing the 1st hour and steadily all week often having double hookups while I struggled with just 3 fish the entire week

In reply to Post #1
I was baiting 3 swims around a lake I was fishing a couple of years ago. All in the 3 most unpopular swims. I baited from march - may in a swim that was probably the 2nd least fished swim on the lake. Very rarely anyone fished it.

So this lake, you're not even allowed a non fishing guest over there. One day the weather looked ideal for one of these swims. I drove down early morning midweek and to my devastation see a bivvy in this swim. He had just chucked out he hadn't baited or anything .......and by chance was right on my spot. Part and parcel of it all. BUT this geezer wasn't a member. He was just a friend of a bailiff. What a joke. Prime time I'm not allowed my brother on there who used to be a member to drink a cup of tea with but these guys have their mates over. Next morning I walked round for a chat. He'd had the biggest fish out of the lake at over 50lb. Now I was happy for him but gutted. Gutted that he'd got lucky as he'd basically just chucked his rods out. Wasn't for any other reason than that. He hadn't seen anything and cast into it. Or found a nice spot and cast onto it. Just got lucky. AND he wasn't even a member which I think is a joke. It's one thing having some guests over in the slow months but not in prime time.

Now I'm not saying I'd have caught the big one. It may have ejected my rig or decided to not eat my bait. But it was on the spot and eating. Odds on I would have. I put so much effort in over them months. It left a sour taste in my mouth. Not towards the guest. But towards his mates, the bailiffs.

Shocking.

Brother in law at the time dropped of myself and my mate on his way to work for a days fishing and pick us up after work on his way home.

I push my bank stick in, lose my balance and end up in the water. I'm calling my mate for help but he couldn't see me. I told him (I'm here, here in the water.) Managed to get out and my fags were well n truly fecked, lost my money so was unable to walk across the shop to buy some and I'm soaked to the bone, cold and 10 hours to go before I'm picked up.

Probably not the worst thing ever, but a time I remember being the most angry. I was freshly spooled up with braid fishing at fairly long range. I was using backleads, I can't remember why exactly, the swim was fairly high up from the water, so the backleads were to keep the line down I think.

I had a run, and as I picked up the rod it instantly felt weird. An eel had tangled its self up in my braid around one of the backleads, it then had managed to pick up the other two rods and did what eels do, it tangled all 3 rods up, just under the rod tips. I ended up having to cut the line to get the eel out, loosing 100+ yards of braid off each rod. I had to respool each reel next trip at the cost of £90 odd quid.

Not the worst in some instances but definitely my worst last April it was feeezing I had a run on one of my rods after waiting a couple days for any action

As I was playing it I put my right foot on the wooden sleepers at the front of the peg it was extremely slippery I then did the splits rolled straight into the lake completely under 🤦‍♂️

I accidentally let go of my rod then realised I had when I come up it was in the water so I dived straight back under managed to get the rod back but the fish was gone, I was freezing! Never been so cold in my life 🤣 my mate who I was fishing with wasn't very helpful he couldn't move for laughing so much 😂

Mid Winter, the swim I was in had a branch on a tree in my way that I kept hitting my rod tip on, I came up with a plan that I would climb up the high bank behind me, jump out, grab the branch and snap it off and it worked perfect. The only problem was, I never thought no more about after snapping the branch off and I just belly flopped into the pond and went completely under.

Back in the 60's the carp lake I was fishing had a very shallow margin covered in floating algae and to wash your hands in clear water you had to walk out about 15 yards in about a foot of water. All went well until I discovered an unseen great deep hole under the algae and went straight down up to my waist. I spent a night soaked to the skin and next morning, worse was to come, I don't know what I was thinking, but I did exactly same again in the same hole when I waded out to wash my hands, so spent another day soaked.

In reply to Post #1
I must have been maybe seven years old, and my dad had just got me one of those spinning rod and reel kits. I was over the moon. I couldn't wait to get out and give it a go and had spent all week reading an angling magazine he'd gotten me, which had a long feature on lure fishing and various lure fishing casting techniques.

Finally the weekend came and my dad took me down to the local canal to have a go. After getting set up I proudly talked him through this new super cool one handed casting technique I'd read about. After a good build-up then I get set for my first ever cast with my prized new rod and reel, with my cool new technique, only to promptly let go of the rod mid-cast and launch both rod and reel into the canal!

In reply to Post #2
This is wounding mate.

Happened to a good friend of mine as well, spent all year chasing the biggest in our syndicate, all around the lake, walking it most mornings & putting serious graft in. Come
Christmas that year, after probably 100 or so nights since Jan, he pulls off to spend Xmas with the family and another member (who's had all of the stock at least 3 times bar one smaller one) drops in behind him having seen nothing & with no one else on (pit is 50 acres or so). Next morning, you guess it, big girl comes out to this guys rods and is passing my mates bait heavily on the mat- also at a new lake record & the 4th time this angler has had her.

So many variables in angling but sometimes it's just not your day.

I often feel as though I am the worlds unluckiest (perhaps worst) carp angler - catching Pike on boilies, casting into bushes, getting stuck in mud whilst wading, etc....but the worst thing that ever happened was a 2.5 oz lead smacking me in the face after popping out of a drifting weed bed whilst rod was doubled over and line stretched to max. Knocked me flying, huge spurts of blood (still on some of my luggage), several stitches about 10mm below my left eye.

When I got to A&E it was like Moses parting the red sea, everyone gawping at me in horror, covered in blood and looking ridiculous. Those stitches were extremely painful going in despite being injected in the face with painkillers.

Could have been worse - could have hit me in the eye or in the mouth.

Feeling sorry for myself, went back a day or so later to the same swim and caught my best fish from that venue - not been back since.

Worse thing that's ever happened to me is I caught my foreskin in my zip after a hedge ticket whilst fishing and couldn't get the bugger back out it was worse than the time I got a hook in my finger past the barb or a baiting needle I sat on that went in about an inch, winter time as well it smarted a bit when I got the pliers on the zip for the big heave-ho came past on the 3rd attempt had a foreskin that resembled a bit of chewed up gristle.

In reply to Post #10
My god. I wish I couldn't read.

Feel like I did OK with a mere face full of stitches.

I thought i had a story, but after reading all this i came to the conclusion that i'm doing just fine

In reply to Post #10
Goodness me.

How many stitches....fore?.

I've been shot at...whilst fishing ,and had a single bore 20mm,let off next to my head but that's for another time...!

Worst thing ,should've listened to mother...I lived near the Harbour ,not far from the famous witch museum.

After college one day I fancied a float fishing trip off the rocks ,for garfish and pollock,etc..Mum's words ,watch the 7th wave and that new swell..,she knew all about the dangerous blowhole in the harbour ,as when she was young ,many lost their lives on the turn of the tide..

I'm fishing away ,long story short ,a big wave took me and my rod straight off the rocks ,no problem ...I couldn't get back up the slippery rocks so started to swim along where the sewage pipe was or still is, that was fine ,til I got cramp..


Anyway I owe a lot to Mr Tony Longman ...local skipper ,picked me up and I was ok.

You can see the ledge ,it is called profile rock ,Queens head ..in Boscastle Harbour....


I've other stories ,like being stuck in silt in January on Bodmin Moor..lol..2 miles off the nearest lane..

My mate had a diabetes hypo after playing a double figure carp and fell in the lake face down, I jumped in to save him, turned him over, pulled him to the bank and gave him CPR while up to my waist in water and on the phone to the emergency services, then held onto him holding him up for 45minutes until the paramedics and fire brigade arrived.

He's 6ft5 over 20stone and it took 5 firefighters drag him out of the water.

The fish also survived.

So when Dave says he owes me his life, he means it...

I spose apart from my post 1 my other significant WORST day I should share
day 2 of a 2 week French trip and unusual for me I went with a mate as we had booked a big double swim on a Large French owned lake
we could use boats and shared a 2 metre inflatable I had spent quite a few hours that day pressure cooking our shared sack of hempseed this was in one of those large polly bucket things parked in between us as
my m8 decided to pull the boat up on the bank between us to clean up some spilt bait

I was fishing with braid and used to like using the off the ground casting
and all the time he had been pulling the boat out and poncing about I had noticed what looked like a big fish well off to the left of my spots so despite it was probably close to the limit of my casting I had to give it a go
so eyes on the prize all the time I wizzed the left rod that had not been out long
and hung on one of my ready made 5 boily PVA strings
keeping my eyes fixed to spot I felt the donk of the lead hitting the ground behind me
((not knowing my pal instead of dragging the trug of hemp back further the plonker had dragged it behind me next to my shelter ?

of course as I REALLY gave it the biggun !! and it hooked the handle and I experienced a new burning level of pain trust me !

a point worth noting !!! on arrival at the nearest hospital THEY WOULD NOT EVEN LOOK AT IT UNTIL I PRODUCED PASSPORT AND MY EHIC card (European Health Insurance Card) AND FILLED IN THE FORMS THEY WOULD NOT EVEN LET MY M8 FILL IT IN !!!!! IM RIGHT HANDED AND STRUGGLED WITH MY LEFT HAND DOING IT

however on a good note the guy that sewed it said it was lucky as he was a micro surgeon
it had actually grooved the bone but not gone thru it was rather a lot of stitches half of them you cant see in the picture
oh yea and the Iodine he tipped on it as he said lake water can cause lots of infections
I think my bum bit a lump out of the chair !!!!

Being beside a train line, squatting down arse out, when the packed 9am commuter train came past, an absolute sea of faces all seemingly watching me do my morning business 🤣🤣🤣

I've ended up in A&E having stitches in my hand from a pikes tooth cut. I've accidentally done a forward flip off a dam wall into the lake on a pushbike with tackle strapped to it.

Funniest of the lot though (to me atleast) was my mate getting his rods tangled in an electric fence while carrying them. The time between shocks meant he couldn't let go!!! I had to run the length of the fence to find the control box and disconnect it!

All many years ago though

In reply to Post #17
OG that is a serious pic

Have posted this on a previous thread but still makes me wonder why I keep doing these trips !!

Quite a few unfortunately !!

Most of them on one trip though, fishing at a remote lodge in Zambia for tigerfish.
Day 1, one of our boats got bumped and bitten by a hippo.
Day2 we pulled into the riverbank to bypass some nasty rapids, spoke to 4 native kids that were playing and messing about on the bank, handed over the usual sweets and pencils etc, came back 10 minutes later to collect the 2nd boat to find only 3 youngsters, one had been taken by a crocodile in that short period and never seen again
Day 3 we nearly had somebody washed over the waterfall when they lost their footing, thankfully we managed to grab his ankle and he was saved the 20m drop into a pool of crocs.
Day 4 some of the guys were taking photos of 'just some snake' that had come out from a nearby termite mound for a slither around the camp. Turned out to be an 8ft Black Mamba that unfortunately had to be despatched, it had been partly injured by one of the camp staff but I had to deliver the coup de grace before it used it's last energy to tag one of my customers !!

Day 5 was a peaceful day !!

Despite that it was one of the best trips we've had.

Got called over to a guy who had been injured on Lake Nasser once, asked if we had any plasters on our boat. Poor guy had slipped on one of the mountain tops into a crevass and had gouged his thigh almost to the bone. Just missed Femoral artery so could only clean it out, soak in iodine and steristrip it back together. Met him in the hotel after the trip and he'd had 160 stitches once he got back to civilisation.

On returning from a trip to Panama a couple of years ago I was sat in my office a few days later when my daughter announced that we had a scorpion in the dining room !! Managed to shut the cat away and capture it before disposing of it, I may have had a bit of a bollocking for that one !!! Little sod had crawled into my gear at the lodge and survived going through the wash and had fallen out of my shorts that were drying out in the dining room on an airer.

In reply to Post #20


I once got bullied into the water by a herd of aggressive cows. Doesn't really compare ...