East Coast Fishing

Coastal fishing is a way of life within an industry that has provided a living for communities up and down England’s East Coast for generations. Today the fishing industry is under pressure as never before and the number of people working in it has dwindled but these coastal waters around our country have been fished for various fish and shellfish for millennia. The work is often difficult and dangerous, the hours unsocial but many traditions continue alongside modern methods and technology. This is a visual portrait of those people who are still trying to maintain this remarkable way of life and an important part of our food chain as well as a part of our national heritage.

Look through these photographs and you will quickly see the unique challenges of making a living by coastal fishing today in the stunning but at times harsh environment of the coastal waters of the East of England on the edge of the North Sea, from the North Eastern ports, along the Yorkshire and Lincolnshire coast, to the Wash, East Anglia and the Thames Estuary.