It was with sadness that I recently read of the death of Alex Behrendt although now only known by a few fishermen he was once one of the modern sports founding fathers. It is a great debt our modern sport owes this individual. Who after the Second World War chose not to return to his occupied Germany but rather to stay in England. He had before the War worked in a fish farm and he would put these skills to good use after a conversation with Alfred Lunn river keeper for the Houghton club Stockbridge, he decided that he would stock Trout.

It was from this simple idea and £1,250 he purchased a plot of land near Romsey in Hampshire 33 acers of overgrown woodland and two ponds. He also purchased an old bus that would become his home, workshop and office as he landscaped the woodland and developed the lakes. After months of back breaking work a fishery simply called two lakes was created. It was this fishery that soon became the focus of fly fisherman throughout the land as his skills as fishery management made Two Lakes a centre of excellence.

He taught others his skills and organised conferences at his fishery were speakers would travel from around the world to attend. The rich and famous fished at two lakes but so did the everyday man. Soon fisherman such as Frank Sawyer, Oliver Kite and Bill Sibbons visited and started to take this story to new heights as they were all expert river fisherman they adapted their patterns many of which are still to be found in our fly boxes and tactics to catch trout in these new surroundings.

If it had not been for Two Lakes and other stillwaters of the sixties fly-fishing in England would have remained available to only those privileged enough to afford the Test and Itchen. Today we are lucky anyone who wishes to try their hand at fly-fishing can easily find a local venue at an affordable price this is by no means a small tribute to Two Lakes and its founder Alex Behrendt.

In any other sport there would be a small blue disk by the bank of two lakes with here marks the birth of English Modern Trout Stillwaters written upon it. Alex Behrendt 1910 – 2005 thank you for your contribution to british fly fishing.

Postscript

After his death in mid October obituaries have appeared in the Times and Telegraph daily papers and online. These became widely copied around the world by many websites people who wished to know more soon started finding Rodfishing.net and many emailed me asking for more details on Two lakes.

I am sad to report that after Alex Behrendt retirement Two Lakes Fishery fell into decline. The seven lakes that made Two lakes slowly became silted and overgrown and closed as many fisheries do. Alex remained in his home next to his fishery and wrote several reports on its slow sad demise. I at this time do not know if Two Lakes has been saved in any form or if it is derelict. Either way this country has lost a national treasure and we can only hope that some when in the future it could be resurrected for fisherman every where. I hope that this may happen but fear as we speak it may have become ear marked for another faceless housing estate.

Alex Behrendt did however leave us an excellent book The Management of Angling Waters this book although written in the seventies still has many words of wisdom for anyone wishing to start or manage a fishery. It is this that we have to show the genius of a man who created a dream that was Two Lakes fishery.

Those who are regulars to this website will know in October we announced the sad news that Alex Behrendt farther of modern British Stillwater’s had sadly passed away we told briefly the story of Two Lakes and many of you contacted me asking if you could fish this Stillwater. I announced that it was our belief it was no longer a fly fishing water and its location seemed to be lost.

Well we couldn’t really leave it there so I sat down and read Alex Behrendt book Fishery Management of Angling Waters. Thinking well it will have the address of Two Lakes in it but no, it would not be that easy. He did describe the stream that fed two lakes eventually joined the test just above Romsey and its location was between the Test and Itchen. It was mentioned that the London to Bournemouth road ran pass the property remember this was 1970’s before the M3 so it was the A3090, but sadly not a lot more could be found. Google gave me 3 Articles one of them my own that had appeared on hundreds of sites around the world at the time of Alex’s death but Googles search on Two Lakes basically was a waste of time. I remembered story’s told of two lakes by Bill Sibbons, I remembered Jack Hargraves Out of Town that was filmed several times at Two Lakes but none gave me an address. The ordinance survey was fun as mentioned before Two Lakes originally had Two Lakes but as time went on this number grew to seven lakes but as the fishery was famous as Two Lakes the name never changed. Foreign readers in particular will not be aware that this part of Hampshire is a mass of streams and lakes so their were in fact many possible locations.

Eventually I was lucky to find a reference to Two Lakes in H.F. Wallis Stillwater Trout Fisheries published in 1976

Two Lakes
Crampmoor, Nr Romsey, Hants.
Off A31 Winchester to Romsey road 2m E,NE of Romsey.

Permits £178.20

This was sadly the best directions I could find so when a few days latter I found myself in a car with a friend heading towards Stockbridge a small diversion was too irresistible. We headed from Romsey towards Winchester after a while we considered we must be near and pulled over onto a small side road so we could look on the map.

Imagine our surprise when as we looked at the Gates we had parked by on a very muddy lane, someone had just pulled back some very old ivy to show the Words Two Lakes. We both looked at each other in total surprise. We had both considered our chances to be very slim of finding anything and here we were parked outside, we gingerly got out and peered down the long drive but all we could see was a new house and swimming pool an Alsatian at this point started barking. I remembered that Alex had kept two Alsatians to deter Poachers but had trained them not to attack fisherman I considered looking for a fishing rod so not to be attacked by this guard dog, I then realised this dog was unlikely to belonged too Alex. So sadly we decided as the Alsatian showed us his teeth once more to retreat.

The small lane continued so we followed it hoping to get a glimpse of a lake but sadly all we could see were new houses and high walls. We drove down the lane for a short distance until we got to a small lane that doubled back and followed our original lane back in the direction of Romsey. We decided to follow it for a while but quickly noticed a small stream crossing under the road. We pulled over it was a very small stream just a trickle and Alexs words echoed in my head. In his book he noted that people never believed that such a small stream fed two lakes everyone would ask if there were springs on the site and never believe him when he said no. The small stream crossed under the road and trickled through a gap in two large banks with trees that curtained the site. To most this would not have been of interest but reminded me of so many still waters I know peering through the Trees I saw a small lake terribly overgrown but a lake. Yes it is sad to report that Two Lakes trout fishery is no more but at least one lake still exists. The Chinese say a person, does not die until they are forgotten we can say if that is the case Two Lakes will live forever and now you have read this article Two Lakes lives on in your memory and is not forgotten.