Has a good thing come to an end?

 

One of Ernest Hemmingway's best short stories is called "The end of something." It's about a young lad called Nick Adams and tells of him breaking up with his girlfriend. The setting is a deserted mill and lumber yard in 1920's America, and it carries a poigniance for anyone who has ever loved and lost. There's a saying that "all good things come to an end" and I'm beginning to wonder if my love affair with a lake I often refer to as "the Perch Pond" is drawing towards its close. It's not that I don't like the place anymore, it's just that a lake that over a period of several winters provided me with over 20 perch that exceeded the 2 pound mark and 3 or 4 times as many that were between 1 and 2 pounds has failed to deliver any perch of even a pound in my last half dozen trips. Last year the biggest I pulled from its depths would have possibly scraped in at 12 ounces, and I'm struggling to escape the feeling that it may be time to explore new waters for their winter perch potential. 

The lake in question is small and shallow, and although it receives a reasonable amount of angling pressure it was only myself and a few friends who quietly went about our business pursuing its perch. It remains a mystery to me why most of the anglers who fished it ignored the perch (perhaps they were unaware of their existence?) and chose to target 6 or 7 pound carp on poles or method feeders rather than gloriously hump-backed specimen perch. Whatever the reason, their loss was our gain. All anglers love to theorise, and my only conclusion is that the large perch must all have been aging warriors of the same generation, and that age group has now largely died off. It's hard to come up with a different explanation. It can't be predation because the lake's other species all appear to be thriving. 

As is so often the case with break-ups (I should at this point make it clear that I've been married for 30 years and have no desire or plans to seperate, my comments are made from observation not experience!) the decision from a logical point of view isn't complicated (the lake isn't producing large perch anymore, so a new venue needs to be found) but the difficulty is caused by the memories and the way the lake's story has become a part of my story. Perhaps it's less about the fish caught and more about the way the lake, for a small group of us, became "our secret." Both of my brothers journeyed from afar to fish it with me, I fished it with my son and several of our fishing friends, and every year it plays host to a charity fishing event run by the Christian Anglers group I belong to. It's less a case of walking away from the lake's perch (or absence of them) and more a case of reaching the final page of what's been a pleasant and rewarding chapter in my angling life. 

I'll give the pond a couple more chances this Autumn, but I suspect it'll soon be time to start exploring again, trawling the internet, keeping an ear to the ground, listening out for rumours of perch in local waters, and wading through dissapointments until a new lake with large and catchable perch is discovered. In the meantime, my message to the lake is "we've had some good times, we're not as good together as we once were, let's stay friends, and thanks for all the memories..." It does feel like we've arrived at the end of something.

(Not) the biggest fish of all

Summer came early this year, but so too has autumn. A warm, sunny and dry May was the prelude to a long, hot summer but even as the the August heat beat down, the leaves were beginning to turn from green to golden.  The paradox of autumn is a metaphor for life - its brief burst of beauty is in reality a harbinger of decay- as the poet Robert Frost reminded us "nothing gold can stay." Impermanence and provisionality are the signature of the season. Beyond such philosophical musings, the onset of Autumn signals the resumption of my perch fishing activity.

I arrived at the lake at around 7:30am, and within twenty minutes had picked my pitch and was dropping my porcupine quill float into a perchy looking spot next to some marginal reeds. A further twenty minutes elapsed before the float dived into the depths. My response of a swift upward sweep of the rod was met with firm resistance and the next few minutes saw me being led a merry dance by a fish which turned out to be not the hoped-for perch but rather a stillwater barbel. While, along with most right-minded anglers I am no fan of stocking thse denizens of running water into lakes and ponds, the barbel in this lake always fight hard, appear vigorous and healthy, and swim away in determined fashion when released. 

I rebaited my size 10 barbless hook with a fresh king prawn and continued trickling red maggots and the occasional broken up prawn into the swim. The sun rose in the sky, pleasantly warming my skin but providing far from ideal conditions for perch to feed in. About half an hour after my opening barbel I was once again playing a spirited fish which turned out to be the twin of its predecessor. 

By now, the sun was shining with purposeful intensity and beams glimmered and danced on the rippling water. Occasionally a few grey clouds would appear, and for a minute or two the sky would darken and the gloomier interlude would produce in me the hope that the lower light levels might induce the perch to come on the feed, but each time the wish failed to materialise into reality and the float remained obstinantly motionless.

As I entered the final hour before my planned midday finish, I decided on a change of tactics. The prawn was proving singularly unsuccesful at provoking a response, and so on the basis that one popular definition of insanity is "doing the same thing over and over again while expecting a different result", and not wishing to be thought insane, I switched to a small hook and double red maggot. I knew that this would inevitably trigger the capture of a procession of small fish, but my first ever 2 pound perch fell to double red maggot on a small hook, as also did my biggest ever perch of 2lb 15oz, so in the absence of any other encouraging signs it was as worthy an experiment as any. In the event, the anticipated steady stream of small fish (most of which were the target species in miniature) ensued, but without the bonus of anything sizeable.

As the clock in the neighbouring village chimed twelve times, I swung the float to the bank for the last time and began the task of packing up. After a spring and summer of almost constant and uninterrupted success with tench, topped off with new personal bests for both tench and crucians, today's session had proved to be a chastening object lesson in the capricious nature of fishing. After a summer spent almost entirely sat behind bite alarms it had been enjoyable to once again be manipulating a float and using a centre pin reel, but the lack of a sizeable perch to open my account had led to the enjoyment being tinged with dissappointment. 

I suspect that my perch campaign may prove to be somewhat more challenging than my tench one was.  One of my favourite fishing books is one that has become something of a collector's item in recent years. Produced by The Perchfishers it's title borrows from Dick Walker's comment that perch are "the biggest of fish." Not today they weren't!

Farewell to summer

There's a line in John Clare's poem All nature has a feeling that offers the thought that "woods, fields and brooks in silence speak happiness beyond the reach of books." Clare, who was known as "The Peasant Poet", was dogged throughout his life with what would nowadays be described as mental health problems which saw him more than once make an attempt on his own life and, on several occasions, led to him being institutionalised, so it's a comforting thought that amid the tumult of all that assaulted and afflicted his consciousness there were moments when the natural world brought him a peace that transcended both the beauty of the written word and the anguish of his mind. Like Clare, I love words, but like him I'm aware that they are never an adequate vehicle to capture what they endeavour to express. The thing observed is always bigger than the thing described.

What for Clare was "woods, field and brooks" is for me "woods, fields and ponds" and today I made my final pilgrimage of this year to the pond surrounded by woods and fields that is the location for my Spring and Summer tench fishing. This, at the tail of Summer and on the cusp of Autumn, was to be my last foray in pursuit of tench until that point next year when, as the world spins on its axis, Spring will inevitably once again succeed Winter and my tench rods will once again be set free from their  resting place in the garage. My fishing is nothing if not seasonal. 

Although this is the ninth time I've visited the pond since joining the syndicate in May it was the first time I've fished it in an evening and so I was curious to discover how it would respond and when and if the fish would feed. After certainly the hottest and possibly one of the dryest summers on record, a ridge of low pressure had blown in, and gentle spots of rain added to the novelty of my first evening excursion as I made my first speculative cast.

Fortunately, the shower was short-lived and soon gave way to bright skies and late afternoon sun. Almost an hour had passed when the bite alarm emitted a constant high pitched tone. The resulting strike met brief resistance but failed to tear off in the manner typical of the of the lake's tench (whose initial run would not disgrace an angry carp), leading me to conclude that a tench had been momentarily attached before becoming cunningly unattached. However, seconds later it became clear that the fish was still connected to the line as it made a couple of half-hearted runs in protest at the ignomony of being hooked. As I drew the fish towards me a flash of gold beneath the water's surface told me that I was playing a large crucian, and a few seconds later I was gazing at the buttery flanks of what I instantly knew was my new personal best crucian.

The scales indicated a weight of 2lb 3oz, easily eclipsing my previous best, a 1lb 9oz Marsh Farm warrior. The pond's crucians are rare visitors to the bank, my fish being only the sixth to see an angler's net this year, but those that do get caught all tend to be of a good size. The weather continued to defy the forecast, but the fish seemed to be apathetic in mood. There were few exuberant or fearful splashes from small fish and, save for a brief ten minute spell, no bubbling or fizzing to denote that the tench were active. The same could not be said for the lake's duck population who were in sociable mood, a large flotilla making frequent visits to the area I was fishing, although they caused me no trouble.

I packed up three hours after my first cast, with no further fish added to the tally. The syndicate lake, which has a reputation for being challenging has been generous to me in my first summer fishing it, and the crucian was a welcome last gift from it. The tench have fallen regularly to my baits and this evening's "crock of gold" was the proverbial icing on the cake.  Before leaving I allowed myself an extra glance at the lake, resplendant in its late summer glory. The peasant poet was right- some things are so lovely they defy description.

Fishing on repeat

Great pianists become great pianists, in part, by repetition. You don't get to play the Royal Albert Hall (or even the local village hall) without hours spent practising scales and arpeggios, or so I'm led to believe by friends who are musicians. In a similar vein, average anglers (of which I count myself one) don't acheive respectable results without paying attention to what works and  repeating the process until it stops working. I offer this Spring and Summer's tench fishing as a case in point. When I was fortunate enough to be granted permission to join the syndicate I was warned by existing members, all finer anglers than I'm ever likely to be, to expect plenty of blanks and only a few tench. "It's not an easy water" was the consensus view, and so I set my expectations accordingly. "If I manage two or three tench I'll have done well" I told myself and a couple of early blanks seemed to vindicate both the prevailing view and my initial goals. However, more by luck than judgement, I hit upon an area of the lake and a method that worked, and before this morning's trip I'd managed fourteen fish from eight sessions, with six tench over 5lbs in including three in excess of 6lbs, with a biggest that was just 4 ounces shy of 7lb. All have been caught from just two swims and all have fallen to the same tactics. A time will come when curiosity and the desire to experiment will force me to try new areas and approaches but, for now, I'm tenching on repeat and reaping the rewards. 

And so it was that this morning I found myself setting up in a familiar pitch, employing the same method, and casting to the same spots that had served me well over the last three months. Like the man said: "if it ain't broke, don't fix it."

I was set up and fishing by 6:30am and an hour into the session I found myself attached to a tench which seemed none too pleased to be attached to me. The fish fought well, so I was surprised as I drew it over the net to see that it was a smaller than average fish for the lake. It wasn't the most handsome of fish either, showing signs of having been attacked by an otter at some stage in its life, in addition to being blind in one eye. 

My two brothers and I have a fraternal WhatsApp group on which we communicate about our fishing trips, and my brief report which read: "Male, small, blind in one eye, not a good looker" evoked the response from one of my brothers "Have you caught a fish or is that your Tinder profile?" He thinks he's so funny.

Twenty minutes later and I was once again playing a tench, which turned out to be even smaller than the first fish, and at 3lb 2oz is the smallest tench I've landed from the lake to date. 

I fished on until just after 10am, but with no further action to my rods. Apart from one very brief episode, there was no fizzing or bubbling and if the tench were feeding they were being pretty coy about it, with no visible signs to give them away. 

The fish, although unremarkable in size, had been welcome, the weather kind, the scenery faultless, and I had thoroughly enjoyed my few hours spent behind a fishing rod. The powder blue sky had been mostly cloudless but I couldn't help wondering if there's an otter-shaped storm brewing for the pond. A concerning number of the tench I've caught from the lake recently show signs of having had lucky escapes, with nipped tails becoming increasingly commonplace. It would be a shame if these graceful looking but cold eyed assasins spoil what for me has become something of an angling arcadia. The population explosion of otters in the UK along with the preponderance of cormorants means that I (even on my rare sucessful days!) am the least of any fish's problems. An enjoyable morning, but I hope this silver lining doesn't have a cloud. The plan is to be back at the pond, accompanied by my son, in a fortnight's time, probably in the same swim, almost certainly using the same tactics, once again tenching on repeat, and hoping that the otters have found somewhere else to play and someone else's fish to pester.

Return to the pond of dreams

 

The late Harry Middleton, who may well be the best angling writer you've never heard of (Google him), declared that "fishing is not an escape from life, but a deeper immersion in it." He had a point. Since my overnight session with my son James at the very start of July a combination of family and work commitments had made any further forays into the world of fishing impossible, but on the month's final day I was at last in a position to wake early and, if not to escape from life, to immerse myself in its angling incarnation. I had missed not just the pursuit of fish but everything about the syndicate lake - the farmer's field and wood in which it's set, the sound of birdsong, the distinctive and not unpleasant summer smell of the lake, and the dichotomy that is the simultaneous sense of mental calm coexisting with a state of barely suppressed anticipation that I feel when chasing the specimen tench that inhabit its depths. 

With only one other angler, Dave, on the pond when I arrived I was able to fish my favourite swim and set up with a sense of quiet confidence. The sky alternated between displaying a canopy of benign white fluffy clouds set against a background of pastel blue and exhibiting a more overcast and threatening aspect, and the temperature, although mild, never reached anything that could be described as warm. 

I made my first cast, but never felt fully confident in the spot on which I had landed my bait and so after about 20 minutes of fretting I wound it in and recast. With predictable irony, no sooner had I repositioned my bait than tench starting bubbling on the spot from which I'd just removed it. In the event I elected not to chase the fish and risk spooking them by casting on top of them and left my repositioned bait in the channel from which I have enjoyed success on previous sessions, a decision that was vindicated about an hour later by my first fish of the day, a tench of 4 and a quarter pounds. 

As I was unhooking the fish, Dave walked into my swim wearing a broad smile and carrying a net which contained a crucian of just over 2 pounds. His smile was more than justified, it being only the fourth crucian to come out of the lake this year, all four of which have been 2 pound plus fish. I recast and within ten minutes my bite alarm was once again alerting me to the presence of a hooked fish, which fought strongly and was clearly a bigger specimen than its predecessor. On the bank the tench registered a pleasing 6 lb 12 ounces on the digital scales, a handsome old warrior that, in common with  several of the lake's occupants, showed evidence of a historical encounter with, and lucky escape from,  an otter. 

A couple of minutes later Dave was also into a tench, a fish of somewhere around the 4 pound mark and then, as swiftly as it had turned on, the lake turned off, and for the rest of the morning was in an apathetic and recalcitrent mood. The tench bubbles and fizzing subsided, the skies became more uniformly grey and hostile and no further fish deigned to trouble our baits. 

At half past ten, four hours after my first cast, I wound in and packed my tackle into the car to head for home and re-immersion into a different sort of reality. Within two minutes of leaving the lake I allowed myself a smile as the skies opened and rain began to fall. Smug doesn't even come close.

"Who not what" and an overnighter

According to Fun Boy Three aided by Bananarama (or was it the other way round?) "It ain't what you do, it's the way that you do it" but I beg to differ. For me neither what you do or even how you do it is as important as who you do whatever "it" is with. My most recent fishing adventure being a case in point. 

My son James and I had been looking forward to camping on the bank and fishing together for an extended session for months, and so there was a predictable irony about the fact that following two or three weeks of continual sunshine and not a drop of rain that our arrival at the lake was marked by dark skies and heavy rainfall. Undeterred we set up the bivvy that was to be our home for the next thirty odd hours and neatly stored our essential supplies in the small wooden shelter at the back of our swim and set about trying to catch some fish who, we figured, were already wet so would be less bothered by the conditions than us. 

Our initial plan was to target the carp but there appeared to be few or no hard spots on the lake bed and convential carp baits fished on the bottom just came back covered in choddy muck. Pop ups and snowman rigs were tried but to no avail and small Robin Red pellets on the Method only resulted in the capture of small brown goldfish which seemed to go from about 3/4 of a pound up to a couple of pounds. The carp, it soon became apparent, resided beneath the undercut banks where they could take cover under brambles or in the reedbeds. There were few access points that would allow risk free casting to their hideouts and the bankside vegetation meant that there wasn't the option to do the old overcast onto the bank, walk round and drop the bait into the edge trick, and as neither of us had casting sticks (I'm not really into the whole  "wraps" thing) we decided to give floatfishing with sweetcorn a try. This involved getting very wet (the rain had not, at this stage, abated) and catching a further string of small brown goldfish and fantails.

After a break for lunch of hot dogs (with brown sauce as I'd forgotten to bring mustard!) and with the weather now having changed from bone-chilling heavy rain to balmy sunshine we decided to feed a few spots and creep round the lake with our float rods. This inevitably resulted in us landing more non-gold goldfish and ornamentals before I found myself attached to something much more substantial. The rod took on its fighting curve and the centre pin's clutch sang, with the ensuing fight having a few hairy moments, the carp having been hooked close to an extensive reedbed, but eventually my side of the arguement prevailed and James netted a nice mirror carp for me.

There was just time before the gas stoves came out for our evening meal for James to add a fine tench to the tally. His tench showed a preference for luncheon meat, while my carp was taken on sweetcorn.

Food was followed by the lighting of a fire in the fire pit provided by the pool's owners, and our carp rods were recalled to (unfortunately inactive) service. As we waited for the buzzers that failed to sound, we enjoyed a couple of beers and a cigar each before winding the rods in and retiring for the night. It seemed pointless leaving the rods fishing and condemning ourselves to the alert and nervy half-sleep that accompanies the first night of session fishing, when being disturbed by a carp seemed a remote prospect. Added to this, the rain had returned with a vengeance. throughout the night beating a drummer's paradiddle on the bivvy roof, although by the time I emerged from within the bivvy's cocoon at 6am the rain had stopped, thankfully not to return. 

The slightly chill morning air was soon replaced by the warmth of a bright sun and in the couple of hours that preceded breakfast I proceded to catch four tench by visiting likely looking swims, loosefeeding hemp and sweeetcorn and then dropping a float with a hook baited with the ubiquitous yellow peril on top of the feed.

No more tench ensued after breakfast, and the rest of the time before our mid afternoon pack up was taken up with catching a procession of plain goldfish, augmented by the occasional roach. James had another brief dallience with the Method (resulting in - you've guessed- more goldfish and ornamentals) and the session gently moved towards its conclusion. By four in the afternoon we had broken camp, packed the car and were ready to return to our respective homes.

This year, spent mostly on the syndicate lake, has been my most succesful spring and summer for a number of years and the results of this overnighter, if judged purely on the size of the fish caught, would pale into insignificance by comparison. But that isn't the point. I long ago realised that I go fishing for reasons that include, but aren't limited to, the capture of memorable fish. In fact, I think I fish more for memories than I do for fish, and these last thirty hours spent in the company of my now adult son was one that will linger in my memory. Like I said at the beginning, Fun Boy Three/Bananarama got it wrong. It ain't what you do, or even how you do it, it's who you do it with, and to have the excuse that fishing provides for me and James to have "father and son time" is its own reward.

Green without envy

 

To some, green is the colour of envy. Today it was the colour of the lake. Not the lake itself, you understand, but the trees, bushes and grasses that surround and enfold it, along with the lilly pads that speckle its surface. As I arrived at the lake I paused to admire and to wonder how its environs could still look so lush and verdant despite a heatwave and no recent rain.

It was 6am when I drove through the rusty farm gate to the pool, but already it was T-shirt weather. I  made my usual underarm cast, placed the rod on the bite alarm and settled back to see what the morning held in store. On my last visit the lake had seemed in a state of slumber and although I'd managed a brace of nice tench they had done little to alter the feeling of apathetic torpor that the pond had exuded on that occasion. This morning the contrast couldn't have been greater. The lake seemed alive, for the first time since I've been visiting the lake I saw a tench roll, small fish dimpled the surface, and from time to time small patches of tench bubbles could be observed. 

An hour after making my first cast I found myself attached to a tench, which turned out to be one of the lake's smaller examples of the species, weighing in at 3 lb 7oz. Despite its modest size it was blessed with an enormous paintbrush-shaped tail that perhaps accounted for the power with which it attempted to resist being brought to the net.

An hour and a half later and the rod was once again bent into its fighting curve and it was quickly apparent that this was a larger specimen, and so it proved to be as the scales displayed a weight of 6lb 6oz. The fish had the appearance of a wiley old warrior, and a small chunk missing from its tail indicated that it had at some time in the past had a lucky escape from the claws and jaws of an otter. 

The bite alarm sounded for the third and final time at about a quarter to ten, resulting in another fine fish which registered a weight of exactly 4lb. I was aware that if I stayed for another couple of hours I would most likely have caught another tench or two, but something inside me told me that I'd had enough, and that there's more to fishing than accumulating aggregations of numbers. Instead, I slipped the last tench back into the water and went for a walk around the lake to better get to know the place, and  look for potential future swims to try.

 

As I loaded the car to leave, I paused to look at the scene behind the lake, where a slope covered with field of barley gently descends to the distant resevoir that sits at the foot of the hill. A green foreground and a golden background and nestled in between a little known horseshoe shaped pond full of hard fighting tench. Could anything be more perfect?