Peter Cockwill International Fisherman

Coarse fishing from 5 on the canal at Bude in Cornwall Pete has been fly fishing since the age of 11 when he started on the North Cornish streams and then some of the older reservoirs in Cornwall (which are now all coarse waters).

He learnt to tie flies at 14 and in 1965 at 18 began work for the Cornwall River Authority (now the Environment Agency) in the Pollution and Fisheries department before moving to Surrey in 1968 as commissioning Chemist on a new sewage disposal works. This job with a Local Authority evolved into running all the outside works department in the days when Councils did all manner of functions.

At the same time Pete was developing his fly fishing skills as the newly emerging small stillwaters evolved and he also fished the larger reservoirs.

He qualified to teach fly fishing back in 1981 by which time he had already started to develop three small lakes on a private estate into an exclusive syndicate. Being able to operate excavators and most machinery he cut all the wood to make platforms, bank reinforcements, bridges, stores and a fishing hut as well as doing all the maintenance work single handed. That’s many many hours of pushing mowers, sweeping leaves and cutting hedges.