Causeway Lake Twyford & District Fishing Club
Causeway Lake Twyford & District Fishing Club is a carp lake based in Whistley Green, Wokingham, United Kingdom. It has a stock of around carp and is 30 Acres in size. The biggest carp is over 44lb+
The Causeway Lake is an attractive, mature 30 acre gravel pit about a mile south of Twyford, close to the River Loddon, set in very quiet peaceful surroundings and is the club’s premier carp water. Also known as Whistley Mill Fishery (not to be confused with the RDAA water across the road) it got it’s name from the old causeway that used to separate the original pair of pits, which were then dug into the shape of the lake we know today, well over 20 years ago.
As well as carp, the lake contains a small head of large bream, with many well in to double figures. A few tench are also present and in increasing numbers, with the best reported at just over 10lb, so that elusive double is in there. The lake also contains a small head of pike to mid doubles and a reasonable head of perch, with the perch in particular of a good stamp.
The Causeway rose to fame in the late Nineties and early Noughties when it came to national attention for producing ‘that’ massive carp. So much so, that Terry Hearn devoted a chapter of his book, “Still Searching”, to his exploits on the Causeway. This led to many of the dedicated big carp hunters of the time pitting their wits against the now famous fish.
The ‘Causeway Fish’ passed away many years ago and has sadly long gone, and with it the crowds of glory hunters, once again leaving the lake to do it’s own thing, to mature and grow on the next generation of monster carp. The lake was restocked with a healthy amount of the local Dinton strain of carp soon after the demise of the big one. However, just as these fish were breaching the 20lb barrier, disaster struck in the form of the 2007 floods that wiped out most fisheries in the Loddon Valley catchment area. Most of the stock ended up in The Loddon, on their way down to The Thames, leading to a whole stocking of scaley Dinton strain fish in the river Thames!
This led to the installation of the current perimeter fish fence, which was severely tested with rising waters yet again in 2012, with floods of similar proportions to those 5 years previously. In almost a repeat performance, we lost several fish to ditches and in turn to the flows and had no option but to restock once again, with the same strain of carp as before.
These have since been mostly left alone for a good 7 years, when some of them started breaking the 35lb barrier and with one carp in particular going over 40lb at the right time of year. They were then joined with some new blood in February of 2020, when 40 carp of C3 age (3 summers) were stocked between weights on 5.5lb and 7.5lb. Most, if not all of these fish have doubled in size in less than a year. The future is certainly secure thanks to this influx of the finest VS Fisheries carp you have ever seen, a nice mix of Harrow, Leney and Dink crosses and back crosses.
Today the lake has carp mostly in the 15lb to 25lb bracket with quite a few 30’s present. In the past The Causeway has clearly produced really big carp and has the potential to do so again, with the current lake biggie being caught in summer 2020 at a weight of 44lb and 8oz. This is partly due to the massive amounts of natural food in the venue, helped by the regular inflows from the Loddon, bringing nutrient rich water with it.
