The name Alan Blair might not mean anything to you if you are over 40 and, more importantly, not a carp fisherman.

But he’s the driving force behind Nash Tackle and a force of nature as an angler. I’ve known him well for many years, since he was a kid in fact, and always seen in him a truly spectacular all-round angler, just as happy to fish for minnows as he is for carp. So, it was good indeed last week to be out with him, standing side by side in mid-river, trotting the mighty Hampshire Avon beneath Salisbury.

What a blissful day, the sun in a deep blue sky, not a smidgeon of breeze and a glide 60 yards long to explore. We fed in the maggots and a steady stream of goodies resulted... dace, chub, grayling, trout, a salmon parr, a roach or two, gudgeon and a fine river bream. The water ran typically Avon clear, powerful, muscular, over sparkling gravels, combing long tresses of waving ranunculus weed. Soon there were baby barbel feeding at our feet, but look up a while and we marvelled at the bird life, the endless sweep of water meadows and a scene that cannot have altered for decades. And this is what my column is all about: I first fished this mid-Avon paradise 30 years back and to my eye, it hasn’t changed a jot. Am I right? How can that be?

Peter, the legendary and long-term water keeper, agreed when, finally, we tore ourselves from the water to dry out in the sun.

“You’re right, John. The river hasn’t visually changed since I arrived and before that to be honest. It could be the 50s here, old members say when they look out over the view in the evenings. The fishing, you know, can be hard, but that’s because of the push of water not a lack of fish. Salmonids, coarse, everything’s doing well, as well as ever come to that. Why? Well, it’s not your own beloved old Wensum for a start!”

Pete’s right. We’ve all seen the Wensum’s flow shrink over the years until in places it is little more than a pond come summer. That’s like all the East Anglian rivers I know that are abstracted until their bare bones squeak. Both Avon and Wensum are chalk streams of a sort and perhaps the former’s springs are more healthy but, then, in my entire trip I failed to see a single potato field along its banks. The landscape was one of lush, wildlife-rich water meadows, a sylvan 17th century scene.

So, plenty of water in the Avon then, but what about those miles of exuberant weed growth, featuring those two river stars, ranunculus and starwort? Endless tests suggest the water quality of the Avon is high, Pete said, with little evidence of insidious agricultural pollution. Perhaps we have to look again at those water meadows of such never-ending beauty? Again, according to Pete, barely any sprays are used on them and that shows in the burgeoning amount of life. The damp grasses of dawn simply billow out insects as you push through them and, at night, moths swarm in snowstorm numbers. I’ve never seen so many warblers in the reeds, at least not since the late 60s. A 1950s landscape? Yes, near as dammit to my eye at least.

Of course, this is a cherished part of England. Here 27 miles of river and side streams are contained within the boundaries of a single, magnificently-managed estate. This serious portion of countryside is farmed with conservation in mind and the river, too, is maintained to the highest degree... perhaps because there’s money in the fishing. Over £100,000 is realised from angling every year and that pays for two water keepers who maintain the banks, cut the weed, tend to the spawning beds, nurture fry and fingerlings and, vitally, clamp down on predation and poaching.

Compare this with the very best stretch of the Wensum that has never made its owner a single, solitary penny these 50 years - no wonder the vast majority of the Wensum is left to fend for herself and has by and large, spectacularly failed to do so.

The short answer is this. Wild river fishing, that is the best fishing of all, cannot exist these days without copious amounts of TLC. In the 1950s, many rivers looked after themselves, but they cannot today. As anglers, we need to pay or we’ll lose the few remaining decent rivers we have still got.