I TOOK a phone call last Friday from one of the members of the syndicate lake. "Don't bother fishing for carp for the next few days," he said, "they are spawning."

In truth, he phrased it a little more colourfully than that, but the inference was clear. The carp, from precocious five-pounders to battle-scarred warriors approaching 40lb, had gathered in the gravelly margins and were crashing through shallow water in a frenzy of expectation.

We all knew it was coming. The uncommonly cold spring has delayed things, but a few days of warm, constant weather had made it inevitable; the fish had lost their appetites and, for now, could think only of sex. Any interruption from anglers would be pointless - and the height of bad manners, too.

The members of our syndicate are agreed on this, but not all anglers think similarly. Every summer, on lakes all over the country, the same question arises - should we really be here while all this is going on?

Whenever anglers discuss it, someone will adopt the anthropomorphic view - how would we like to be interrupted under the same circumstances? Now, I am no expert on the matter, but this argument doesn't quite stand up to scrutiny; human reproduction rarely occurs so publicly, or for that matter on gravel, and for all but the most unfortunate is not an annual event. But I understand the sentiments.

The reasons for leaving well alone at spawning time are not a matter of human-piscean empathy, but of welfare. Spawning fish are vulnerable enough, often damaging themselves in the frenzy of it all, and any efforts to hook them and remove them from the water, however briefly, can only add to their distress.

And so I would urge all true anglers to wait; there will be plenty of time to catch them when the shenanigans are over.

Meanwhile, over at Cokes Pit, the tench are in mercurial mood. I took a friend there, and the tincas were indifferent. There were no signs of them gathering on the shallows for their own spawning, but those we saw were heavy-bellied and ponderous, suggesting that it will happen soon.

This might explain why they have been difficult to catch this season, and so for me it can't happen too soon - and I suspect, at the risk of a little anthropomorphism myself, they feel much the same.

News and catch reports: jon_s_berry@yahoo.co.uk Twitter: @jonberrywriter Web: www.jon-berry.net