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The Beer and District Sea Angling Association is headquartered at The Beer Social Club, Berry Hill, Beer. Committee meetings are held on the 1st Wednesday of every month. Ordinary members and any new members are always welcome to attend, the AGM is held in November.
The BDSAA supports and is affiliated to the Wyvern division of the National Federation of Sea Anglers.
Beer is a working fishing village as well as a picturesque tourist attraction. The beach is also a working beach for the fisherman whose families have fished here for generations. Thier fishing boats are still launched from the beach and winched back on to the shore, landing their catches of fresh fish, crabs, lobsters and scallops.
About recreational sea angling
Recreational sea angling is one of Britain's largest participant sports in which more than a million boys, girls, men and women take part. It has a long pedigree from ice age cave drawings showing fish caught with a type of rod and line for food and sport, to today where the purpose is the same and the tackle a sophisticated version of the very old.
Sea anglers today have space navigation and weather aids, a great knowledge of where to fish, which local natural or artificial baits to use and electronic fish finders. It is a diverse sport where anglers fish alone or with family and friends from sand or shingle beaches, from rocks, piers or in river estuaries. Many own boats or take charter vessels to anchor, drift or troll close to the shore or miles off the coast over wrecks.
To all anglers fishing is a recreation though some like the added spice of competing in club events or open matches. For the very best there is the draw of the international scene and a chance to represent their country against the best in the world. The world boat championships organised at Weymouth in October this year by the NFSA were the biggest so far with teams from 18 countries.
The NFSA was formed over 100 years ago to protect sea angling as a sport. Its first contact with the government then was about what they considered to be over fishing by trawlers off the Kent coast. The mission remains the same today - to ensure that a million or more can continue to enjoy their angling and that our coastal communities welcome them and enjoy to the full the benefit that their activities bring. This means their voice and that of seaside communities must be heard by government in London and Europe that sensible controls are brought in to stop fish being uselessly caught and killed en masse before they have grown to spawning age, and that the habitats where they live and breed are not ridden over roughshod by destructive fishing gear.
The NFSA exists to achieve all of that.
National Federation of Sea Anglers