A palindrome of perch

 

"It's an ill wind" they say "that brings no cheer", but yesterday's squall brought cheer aplenty as a result of an upturn in my perch fishing fortunes. This winter's perch campaign had started slowly, my first two trips resulting only in the capture of a handful of very small perch which, following four years of almost constant success and the landing of a reasonable number of 2 pound plus perch, was beginning to feel mildly vexatious.  

Following the lack of success on my previous two trips to my favourite perch pond I opted to try a different lake on the same complex to explore its potential, and in the hope that a change of scene might lead to a change of luck. 

Clouds were scudding threateningly across the anthracite sky as I walked around the small lake to choose a swim, eventually settling on a pitch that had a line of reeds in the margins which looked as if they would provide just the sort of cover that a wily perch might seek as a base from which to launch its ambush. An attractive little perch bob float taking just 2BB was threaded onto the line, with a small prawn tipped with red maggot on a size 12 barbless hook completing the simple and unfussy set-up.

I was joined for this short morning sortie by two of my regular companions, Roger and Pete, and after a quiet first hour my float danced a little jig before submerging and I found myself tussling with a lively and determined perch. The fish was admired, photographed, weighed at 1 pound 11 ounces and then returned carefully to its watery home.

Shortly afterwards, the weather, which  had carried an air of menace from the moment of our arrival, decided to make good on its threat and the heavens opened to ensure that the remainder of the session would be not only cold but also wet. Unperturbed I continued to feed small handfuls of red maggots and broken pieces of prawn along the edge of the reedbed and about an hour later I once again found myself connected to an angry perch which several times sought the sanctuary of the reeds before eventually conceding and allowing itself to be drawn into the waiting folds of the landing net. A heavier fish than its predecessor, the second perch of the morning (and last fish of note) pulled the scales to a pleasing 2 pounds and 2 ounces. 

I fished on in the rain for another hour, but only managed to add a couple of very small perch to the tally, and by half past eleven was ready to bid Roger and Pete farewell and pack up to depart for the warmth of home. 

The fishing had not been easy and the weather inclement, but I was pleased with my brace and there was a certain tidiness about the fact that the weights of both of the fish were palindromic- or perhaps it's just a symptom of the peculiar way that my mind works that noticing a mathematical pattern in the capture of two fish pleases me. Whichever of those options is the case, I'm not bothered- we go fishing to be pleased, and I was more than happy with my pair whose numbers read the same whether written backwards or forwards. If this session's 1 11 and 2 2 can lead to a 3 or 3 or even a 4 4 at some point in the future then I suspect my joy will be almost complete!

 

The Perch Match

Autumn: chill air, burnished bronze leaves, and a time when Gerard Manley Hopkin's observation that "the whole world is full of the glory of God" and his assertation that "it (God's glory) will flame out like shining from shook foil" seems hard to gainsay. Creation is singing a song, and its creatures would do well to attune their thoughts to the Maker behind the melody. 

Autumn is also the time when my thoughts turn to the pursuit of perch, although if truth be told, even in high summer and when fishing for tench, carp and rudd my thoughts are rarely far from perch, even if they only amount to a wistful longing for the calendar's colder months. The year's third season is also when the annual John Rellie charity Perch Match is held, a trophy now in its fourth year, and of which I have twice previously been fortunate enough to be the winner. A casual affair, the prize is awarded to the captor of the day's largest perch and is competed for by fisherfolk from the Christian Angler's Club in memory of John, our late member.

As tradition requires, the day commences with a lakeside breakfast of bacon sandwiches before the draw is made for swims, each angler disappearing to choose his own pitch when his name is drawn from the hat. This year my son was also fishing the event, and as it was over a year since we'd last fished together we decided to prioritise sociability above efficiency and opted to share a swim, with whichever one of us emerged first from the hat getting to choose the spot in which we would sit side by side. James and I were lucky with the draw bag being the second to be plucked from the hat and elected to fish a swim that has proved productive for me in the past. Today, however, it proved less than generous to us and we only managed a handful of  small perch in the 4-6 ounce class. We did manage a few nice sized ide which took a liking to our float fished prawns (two for James and one for me) but the opportunity to spend some quality father and son time more than compensated for the absence of perch.

As the morning wore on none of the ten anglers dotted around the lake were finding the going easy and bites were proving hard to come by. As lunchtime was reached only four perch of noteworthy size had been landed, a brace apiece for Garry and Matthew, with the best of them being a magnificent stripy denizen of the deep that tipped the scales to 1lb 14oz which found its way into Matthew's landing net after a spirited tussle.

As morning gave way to afternoon it was as if someone somewhere had flicked a switch and the fish, already reticent to feed with any enthusiasm went on hunger strike and, with the exception of a plodding procession of bream which took a liking to any bait offered by Paul, the lake's inhabitants obdurately refused to offer any encouragement to their land-based adversaries. As the appointed three o'clock finish drew near there was a brief flurry of activity with Pete landing a barbel before Loz threatened to snatch a last gasp victory with a last cast perch which when subjected to the scales transpired to be just 3 ounces lighter than the winning fish. 

It had proved a testing day for the intrepid and windblown piscators, but no-one blanked, 5 perch of significant stature had found their way to the bank, and a new name will shortly be engraved onto the trophy, with Matthew being the well deserved winner. The cash donations on the day from the participating anglers totalled £157.00, with a couple of further payments either by cheque or online promised and yet to be collected, all monies raised to be donated to the Christians Against Poverty (CAP) charity. 

As ever, the conversations, friendship and company were every bit as important as the fish caught and an added piquancy was added by the fact that Matthew's winning fish was landed on a rod he had inherited from his grandfather who very recently passed away. The fishing may have been anything but easy, but the aphorism had once again been proved true: "there's more to fishing than catching fish" or, if you have a penchant for your proverbs in an ancient and now dead classical language: "Piscator non solum piscatur."

My training regime for next year's match begins tomorrow- perch and fellow club members: you have been warned!

 

Perch fishing in transition

Liminality was everywhere as I walked from the car park to the Club Lake, fishing bag over my shoulder, rod and landing net in hand. Summer was changing to Autumn, the nation was preparing to bury its Queen and welcome its new King, and I was transitioning from summer fishing to the annual pursuit of perch which dominates my fishing throughout the cooler and colder months. The world seemed to be in a state of suspended animation, everyone and everything pausing to take a collective breath.

I only had a few hours, and this was to be a casual re-introduction to a campaign that will intensify over the coming months. I had eschewed my usual go-to perch bait of prawns for this session, bringing just a tub of maggots, that simplest of baits, which had been dyed red the more appealing to make them to the perch who, in my experience, have a particular penchant for the colour.

There was the hint of an early afternoon chill in the air, as I flicked my float into the margins and began introducing small handfuls of maggots in the well established "little and often" manner. It wasn't long before I was swinging my first perch to the bank, a buccaneering bristling mini beast, all stripes and spines.

More diminutive perch were to follow, every drop in being met with the float dancing and dipping, with the result always the same- a small perch protesting it's indignation before being returned to the water. Despite the Autumnal temperature it was a summer sun that shone in the sky, not the best conditions in which to pursue bigger perch who are not known for their love of light. Small perch, by contrast, will always feed as they indulge in the essential task of putting on weight- instinct tells them the bigger they grow the safer they become from predation.  

It wasn't long before the voracious hoards of ever hungry carp became aware of the steady stream of maggots entering the water, and the rest of the afternoon saw me alternate between catching juvenile perch and a procession of carp all of which pulled back hard and pulled the split cane rod into a pleasing battle curve. 

In the event, as a a perch fishing opener the afternoon had proved a false dawn. Plenty of perch had been caught, but none of the hoped for size. However, it would be churlish to complain. There are  far worse ways to while a way a few hours, and the absence of quality perch was compensated for by the pleasure of sitting in the sunshine in beautiful surroundings and the tactile quality of  split cane bucking and kicking in response to the determined pull of a lively carp, and (best of all) the steady stream of carp and perch was twice disturbed by the capture of a brace of gudgeon, a fish that transports me back to my childhood and never fails to put a smile on my face.

Today the victory goes to the perch, but there will be many more opportunities to come - a perch campaign is a marathon not a sprint. There will be other afternoons and bigger perch.

Makin memories in Nuneaton

August came and went and was fishless, a sorry state of affairs caused not by any loss of angling  form on my part but rather by a broader loss of enthusiasm and general sense of lethargy. Despite living only 15 minutes drive from my Club Lake, which is always good for an after-work evening session, I found myself too lacking in after-work energy to grace its banks, and for the first time in a long time a whole calendar month passed without me even wetting a line.

In the end it took a trip organised by someone else to shake me from my apathy, and so it was that I found myself fishing Lagoon Lake on the famous Makins complex in Nuneaton for a social with friends from Whetstone Baptist Church's men's group and the Christian Anglers group I belong to. With prizes promised for the biggest fish of the day and for the most species caught, and a mixture of old friends and new acquaintances, this promised to just be the tonic I needed to arouse my from the cloud of tiredness that had enveloped me and sapped me of my customary vim and vigour.

On arrival at the complex I walked into the onsite tackle and bait shop clutching two bait boxes, but the response to my cheery request for "two pints of maggots please" was met with "sorry, mate, we don't do maggots." Clearly, if it ain't pellet it ain't bait, but perhaps that's the price a fishery pays when its sponsored by a bait company. The day hadn't started and I was already in "Plan B" territory!

We drew for swims, mine turning out to be peg 23. I set up a simple float rig, but elected to start with my 2lb TC barbel rod, Method Feeder and hair rigged sweetcorn, with a view to feeding two areas and switching from time to time between float and ledger. The feeder rig was cast to the margin of an island and had barely had time to settle before it tore off and after a short tussle a small but determined mirror found itself  laying on the unhooking mat.

The early fish, however, turned out to be something of a false dawn, and around the lake most of our party of 15 anglers were having to work hard for their fish, with some proving more successful than others but no-one bagging up. Several good carp were caught, the best catches coming to those who kept experimenting and ringing the changes.

Two of the angler's wives visited with their toddlers, and kindly walked around the lake offering homemade cheese twists and chocolate biscuits to our party, tea and coffee was consumed and the occasional stroll around the lake to chat with others of our group made for an enjoyable and sociable vibe, despite the challenging fishing conditions. Shallow water and low oxygen levels seemed to have induced in the carp a spirit of lethargy that our best efforts could only partially dissuade them from.

I managed one more carp, a long torpedo shaped fish of about 5 pounds that not only was shaped like a baseball bat but, sadly, looked as if it had been hit in the face by one, possessing one of the worst parrot mouths I've ever seen, unfortunately not an uncommon sight on Commercials. My final total was just under 30 fish, mostly caught on the float and a mixture of small perch (I "borrowed" a handful of maggots from Gaz), rudd and bream, the majority of them succumbing to sweetcorn. I also contrived to lose a further 3 carp, 1 on my light float and centre pin rig, and two on the barbel rod and carp gear. 

At four o'clock we gathered for the presentation of trophies, with prizes for the biggest fish (won by Sam), the most different species (won by Cliff), and a special "Passion for Angling" award (won by Andrew) for ...... well, I'm not going to embarrass Andrew by committing the reason for the award to print, suffice it to say "what happens at Makins, stays at Makins!"

Early September doubles as late Summer, and the ground around the lake bore the signs of the drought, the earth hard and cracked, but as I left the lake I knew that although for now the trees retained their summer hue, soon the green canopy would be replaced by golds, russets and reds, and Autumn would see me return to my main preoccupation, the pursuit of specimen perch. It had been a good day spent in good company, and I drove away happy, my thoughts already turning to the perch campaign that will occupy me for the next 6 months.

The Solitary Angler

There's a world of difference between solitariness and loneliness. Loneliness is the unhappy bedfellow of isolation, while solitude is a choice. Today, for just a few hours in the afternoon sun, I chose solitude and broke with my normal pattern of fishing in company to enjoy a solo fishing session. It's rare that I fish on my own, mostly electing to share the bankside and make memories with friends, but on occasion choosing to venture to the lake alone brings an added piquancy to the angling experience. The sights, sounds and stillness, (it would be a misnomer to describe it as "silence" as the rustling of wind in the leaves, birdsong, the noise of fish rolling or carp slurping, even insects rubbing their legs together, ensure a constant pianissimo backing track to the angler's endeavours) are all intensified, as too are whatever emotions the fisherman carried with him, baggage-like, to the water's edge. 

Everything about the afternoon was to be simple. My tackle always leans towards the minimalistic, and a light split cane float rod and ancient Mitchell 304 reel made up the hardware, with a small dart float with maggot, that most ubiquitous of baits, impaled upon a size 18 hook forming the business end of the arrangement. This, a landing net, unhooking mat, small shoulder bag and chair were all that was required, and on a scorching hot summer's afternoon the fish were not slow to respond, and before long I was swinging in or playing to the net a succession of lively little fish. The great attraction of the lake I had chosen to fish is its variety, and the procession of fish landed ranged from sleek and slippery mini green tench to blue orfe, perch, carp, ide and some fish which looked remarkably like crucians but almost certainly weren't genetically pure examples of  species Carassius carassius. The lake is also home to some stillwater barbel (yeah, I know, I'm not a fan either!) and the biggest fish of the afternoon was a barbel that probably weighed somewhere between about two  and a half to three pounds. Thankfully, most fish were just a few ounces, which was a relief as any fish too significant in size and stature would have posed a quite possibly fatal challenge to the light cane rod, but the attraction was in the catholic colour palate,  the fish a kaleidoscope of greens, golds, silvers, oranges and browns. 

 

The poet Mary Oliver, who drew most of her inspiration from the natural world, once remarked "to pay attention- this is our proper work", and this was an afternoon for paying attention. Admittedly, my attention was not as rapt as it should have been when it came to watching my float, but this was an occasion for attending to the natural beauty around me and to my own thoughts and feelings- an afternoon to prove true Walton's axiom that fishing is "the contemplative man's recreation."

Over the years fishing has become for me an increasingly aesthetic pastime. I elect to use split cane rods of venerable antiquity, ancient centre pin and fixed spool reels and handmade floats not for their practicality or efficiency but simply because they are pleasing to hold and behold. Today the split cane was alive in my hand, pleasingly transmitting every determined thump of a fish through my wrist and into my arm, and the beauty of cane rods is that, perhaps as a result of being craftsman-made, each rod seems to be endowed with its own personality in a way that a mass produced factory rod never can be.

Halfway through the session I paused to light and enjoy a cigar, laying my rod down and taking in the sights and pondering how much of my angling is an attempt to briefly reconnect with that time when I was drifting from childhood into adolescence and fishing every hour that absence from school permitted. I began angling in the summer just after my 13th birthday in an era that seemed far simpler than today, my parents operating the "benign neglect" method of parenting that was the norm in the 1970's and early 80's which left me with plenty of time to stare at a float and gaze under the surface of a lake and to experience an enchantment that I can still make contact with as an adult drifting no longer from childhood into adolescence but from early into deeper middle age. 

More fish followed,  including a miniature mirror carp that was almost black in colour, until the moment when something inside me clicked and I "just knew" that it was time to pack up and head for home. I'm not a greedy angler, and although I could have carried on catching steadily for as long as I wanted to with the fish in a compliant frame of mind, I had no need to prolong the experience. I had come, paid attention, glimpsed the glory of creation and now was ready for home. I adjusted my "Huckleberry Finn" hat, surveyed the lake one last time and turned to head for the car. As someone once observed "if you're lucky enough to spend an afternoon at the lake, you're lucky enough."

 

Carry on Camping

 

One of the many lessons that I've learned in my time as an Anglican vicar is that it doesn't take very long for an innovation to become a tradition. This year saw the sixth annual Christian Anglers weekend retreat, which I would suggest means that the yearly camping and fishing get together now qualifies as a tradition. 

Our venue, for the second year running (which probably means that it is also on the verge of becoming a tradition!) was the excellent campsite at Purple Badger Camping and Fishing in the East Leicestershire countryside. With a rustic kitchen area and meeting space, horse boxes converted into showers, two luxury "glamping" bell tents (which were allocated on a "first to ask, gets" basis) the facilities are second to none, and the attractive way the pitches have been cut within wilder meadow areas is typical of the sympathetic way that Mark, the owner, has integrated the campsite with its natural surroundings. 

From 4 o clock on the Friday afternoon anglers from Leicestershire, Yorkshire, Nottinghamshire and Shropshire began arriving as tents were pitched and acquaintances renewed. The opening evening is always a relaxed affair and the fish and chip shop run was followed by a meeting in the "Badger's Den" which included a short Bible talk before we gathered around the ubiquitous fire pit to catch up with each other's stories and discuss the prospects for the following day's fishing.

Saturday dawned bright and sunny, the only dark shadow being cast by one of our group having to unexpectedly leave the weekend to be with his family following his seriously unwell mother-in-law being taken into hospital. A fine breakfast of enormous triple-decker bacon, sausage and egg sandwiches was followed by another short faith-building talk in the Den before we set off for the day's fishing venue. After a twenty minute drive we arrived at the small lake, a well maintained and attractive pool set in the middle of a sheep farm. For the greater part of the day the sun shone, the sheep provided a continuous and sometimes raucous auditory backing track, and the carp fed voraciously. Tactics varied, most of us electing to float fish in conventional style, with one of our number utilising a long pole, and a couple dabbling with the Method.

My results were less spectacular than that of some of the others, it taking me a while to realise that the carp were easiest to catch six inches from the very undercut bank, and once I positioned my tiny porcupine float accordingly and delicately lowered  a banded pellet hookbait  at my feet I soon found my old glass fibre float rod taking on its fighting curve as my 70 year old centre pin emitted the welcome sound that denoted an angry carp screaming off with the bait. The carp were not large by modern standards but all gave a good account of themselves, fighting hard and showing themselves to be less than sanguine at the prospect of being brought to the bank. 

We drew stumps at 4 o'clock and headed back to the sun-bathed campsite with everyone having caught fish and a general air of satisfaction pervading the party. Both the weather and the carp had been in accommodating mood, with one of our number quoting the proverb that states that "the sun shines on the righteous", although the actual Biblical quote has a more realistic take on things, Jesus pointing out that "God causes the sun to rise on the evil and the good, and sends rain on both the righteous and the unrighteous" (Matthew 5: 45, 46) but I decided that it would be an act of ungracious theological pedantry to spoil the moment by quoting texts and so refrained!

Back at the campsite we gathered for a Bible study led by one of our members before indulging in the annual rituals of barbequing and bonfires, burgers and sausages being followed by relaxed conversation around the fire as darkness drew in.

Sunday morning saw an unfussy open air communion service with a bread roll passed around and mugs being employed for the wine with an old cable drum fulfilling the role of what some might refer to as an altar, the simplicity being very much in line with the origins of this Christian act of remembrance if not with some of the ornate pomp and ceremony that on the same morning would have been being enacted in many parish churches across the land!

Suitably spiritually refreshed, we walked the couple of hundred yards to the lake on the campsite and spent the morning and early afternoon extracting good numbers of roach, lovely golden hued rudd and perch. For the second year in succession, Phil was the only angler to catch one of the lake's often elusive crucian carp, prompting one member to comment that if he succeeded in doing the same next year, then we'd be compelled to throw him into the lake. If such a happening does come to pass in 2023, I'll probably rebrand his deserved dunking as a "full immersion baptism" and claim it as a liturgical event!

By early afternoon our need to catch fish had been well and truly sated, and we began the task of dismantling tents, clearing up rubbish and saying goodbyes.

Once again, the weekend had proved to be a success, and while I have never in my 25 years of being a Vicar been accused of being a traditionalist, I have always believed that tradition (as opposed to traditionalism) can be a good and worthy thing, tradition being the "living faith of the dead" while traditionalism is often merely the "dead faith of the living", and if the Christian Anglers Retreat does now count as a tradition as far as I'm concerned it's one well worth preserving.

I suspect I'm not the only one already looking forward to next year.

A lazy afternoon in the summertime

 

I know from observation (my wife by paid profession and leisure-time choice is a gardener) that gardening is, above all, an object lesson in faith and hope. Seeds or bulbs are planted with the expectation and desire, although not the certainty, that something living, lustrous and beautiful will in time emerge from the soil. Fishing, similarly, trades on optimism, the dreaming, plotting, planning and, eventually, the execution of a fishing session being undertaken in the hope that a float will disappear, a centre pin sing or a buzzer bleep resulting in the capture of a living creature fooled by the fisherman's cunning into thinking that the bait presented was there as a result of nature's whim not an angler's artifice.

The feeling of hope known by every angler is accentuated when visiting a new venue for the first time, and so it was that Greg and I, with just a few Friday afternoon hours to spare parked and unloaded our tackle beside a new lake, nerves jangling with optimistic anticipation.

The lake was a classic small pond, rarely fished (we had to telephone the owner for him to delegate his wife to drive from their cottage to the lake's gate to let us in), verdant, green, and overgrown, with no proper swims cut into the bank or wooden platforms- a slightly wild and natural look, as if attempts to maintain the lakeside environment and a desire to leave it as natural looking as possible were being held in a pleasing state of creative tension.

The weather was summer's afternoon sultry, and Greg and I set up a few yards from each other on a small promontory that almost served to split the lake in two, and dropped our floatfished sweetcorn into the margins along with a scattering of hand fed sweetcorn. 

Bites were soon forthcoming, although until I had played around with my shotting pattern and depth setting they proved hard to connect with, the ultimate solution being (counter intuitively) to stop fishing on the bottom with just a number 8 close to the hook and the rest of the shot bulked around the float and rather to present the bait in midwater and move a BB shot three quarters of the way down the line to provide deliberate resistance as a fish took the bait. 

The sun continued to shine unabated  as we landed a succession of small but plucky carp, evenly split between commons and some particularly pretty mini mirrors. The fishing was leisurely and the action frequent, as befits piscatorial activity in the summer months.

By the end of three hours we had probably landed somewhere in the region of three score of fish between us, and the convivial conversation, sunshine, peaceful surroundings and eager to please carp had worked their magic. The pressures of work and life had receded, internal equanimity had been restored and a new lake had been added to our list of places worth revisiting. Expectation, hope and faith had been repaid and as we drove out of the soon to be relocked gates our minds were already turning to future trips and other as yet still to be discovered lakes. "Intrepid" would be stretching a point, but "exploration" it certainly is.

Summertime and the fishing is easy ...

Okay, so technically it's still Spring, but for me the demarcation between spring and summer is drawn at the moment I turn my attentions from perch, which I pursue with a seriousness bordering on fanaticism, to fishing for "whatever comes" with a lack of seriousness bordering on nonchalance. In Autumn, Winter and early Spring every perch that looks to weigh 2 pounds is subjected to the indignity of the scales, its weight recorded with precision and almost religious fervour and noted down for future reference. In the summer fish are looked at and admired, rarely if ever weighed and, if truth be known, at times function as little more than the excuse and "presenting reason" to spend time in wonderful surroundings in the company of friends.

And so it was that today, in the company of Roger, I embarked on my summer of idle loafing beside the water's edge. In keeping with the casual nature of the day we shared a swim (the better to talk) and set up in the sunniest spot we could find. As ever, vintage rods and reels were the order of the day for both of us, with me choosing to pair my Wizard with an old Mitchell 304 CAP style reel, the latter a change from my usual preference for a centre pin. 

Despite our casual approach to the pursuit of fish (or perhaps, because of it) we were soon enjoying almost a bite a cast, and a steady stream of mostly small roach, rudd, perch and carp and the occasional gudgeon were making brief visits to the bank before being carefully returned to the lake. I was quickly into a succession of greedy mini perch, while Roger despite catching fewer fish seemed to have established for himself a monopoly on the carp.

My biggest fish of the day turned out to be a perch of around a pound, which provoked Roger to comment that even when I'm not intentionally fishing for perch I end up catching them, leading to his suggestion that I possess some mystical affinity with species perca fluviatilis. 

Although the fish were plentiful, the fishing was never frantic and the session was reminiscent of a slow flowing river, meandering unhurriedly and, to steal a phrase from Paul Robeson, "just rolling along." We talked of work and life and families, with every couple of minutes the conversation being interrupted by a swishing sound as a rod was jerked upwards in response to a bite which, as often as not, resulted in a fish in turn jerking and pulling on the other end of the line. Roger caught a rather beautiful small fully scaled mirror to complement the linear and scattered scaled mirrors and solitary common that he had already landed.

Seconds before the appointed midday finish my float once again dipped and my day and happiness were made complete by a delightful little crucian, my first ever from the Club Lake. Buttery golden and plump, the fish proved to be my last of the morning.

Although today marked the beginning of my summer fishing, the lake has yet to fully embrace the season's characteristics. The lily pads which in a few weeks time will be extensive are only just beginning to dot the water's surface with any serious intent and the musty smell, familiar to all anglers, that lakes take on in high summer has yet to assail the still air. Today we fished in that brief liminal space between the end of spring and the beginning of summer proper.

The sun smiled on us as we trudged back to the car park and the realities of life that lay beyond it. This had been fishing in its purist form- fishing not for records or numbers or weight, but simply for the pleasure that comes from being in charming surroundings and good company. Despite catching a stack of fish I had mysteriously failed to hook a single carp in a water that as the weather warms up tends to be dominated by them, while for Roger, fishing just feet from me and sharing the same swim, carp must have made up about a third of his total catch. 

September will be upon us soon enough, and when it comes round my attention will once again turn to the earnest pursuit of specimen perch, but for the next four months I intend to thoroughly enjoy loafing by the water's edge fishing happily for whatever happens to take a fancy to my bait, and the sights and sounds and friendships will be as important as the fish. The 19th Century Danish philosopher and theologian Soren Kierkegaard once offered that "far from idleness being the root of all evil, it is rather the only true good." I think he may have been right.

The Last perch

In the summer of 1981 three brothers then aged 13, 11, and 8 started fishing. Forty two years on and fishing continues to provide for them common ground upon which memories are formed. Despite the inevitable geographical diaspora that is the norm for modern families, every year the three of us  manage to fish together at least once, and modern technology has given opportunity for our own private WhatsApp group in which catch photos are shared, stories told, questions, musings and conversations aired, almost all of them piscatorial in nature although, if truth be told, football chatter is also occasionally permitted to intrude. It would be a grave mistake to conclude that fishing provides the only glue that binds together the fraternal bonds (kinship and shared memories go far deeper than just the pursuit of fish) but it would equally be a mistake to underplay the part this jointly owned love of angling contributes to the connection between three men who are brothers by the accident of birth but friends by virtue of choice.

And so, six months after the three of us last fished together, and on the occasion of my 54th birthday,  we were once again to be found in each other's company by a lake, on what for me would be one final session with perch as the target species before switching to the more traditional species of summer, with hopes that we might each land at least one in excess of the magical 2 pound mark. 

The sky overhead was overcast and the air carried a chill, but the prospects looked bright when within five minutes of lowering my prawn hookbait next to an enticing looking snag my float dithered and bobbed before burying decisively. An equally decisive strike saw me connected to an indignant perch, which tipped the scales to 1lb 12oz. Not quite a 2 pounder, but an excellent start to the day.

However, rather than being a portent of good fortune and easy fishing, the "early doors" perch turned out to be something of a false dawn, and over the ensuing hours every bite had to be earned by hard work and cussed determination. It was an hour later that we had our second respectably sized perch, a slightly smaller fish of 1lb 10oz, with me again being the fortunate captor.

All three of us had started with float fished prawns, but as the morning went on Andy and Tim also experimented with maggots (which only resulted in small fish) and worms, but despite these changes and the fact that all three of us were feeding our swims with a regular trickle of loose maggots and chopped prawn pieces, perch of decent calibre remained hard to come by. Eventually, around lunchtime, youngest brother Tim got himself off the mark with the first of what would be for him a brace of perch, the larger of which was just under a pound and a half.

In the meantime I had landed the first of three ide that took a liking to my bait, the fish putting a pleasing bend in my split cane rod, and for the merest fraction of a second as I drew the fish over the rim of the net I wondered if I was looking at my new personal best roach, but once on the bank the fish's real identity was clear to see. My pb roach, a 1lb 14oz fish caught in Devon, remains my best redfin some 20 years after its capture, but the ide was a handsome fish and a pleasing distraction from the gruelling pursuit of the less than compliant perch.

Andy had placed himself in a likely looking corner swim, with reeds lining the margins, every bit the textbook type of swim that Mr Crabtree would have chosen, and eventually his fortitude was rewarded with a brace of respectable perch. He had experimented with both worms and maggots, but it was a return to a prawn fished hard on the bottom that turned the tables in his favour.

The day wore on with the lake moodily continuing to give up its perch only with the greatest of reluctance, although I did finally manage to complete the hat trick with a final fish of 1 lb 12oz.

Although seven perch all in excess of a pound might sound like a pleasing result (as indeed it was), the three of us had fished hard for nine hours with long spells between bites, the lake seemingly flicking on and off as if some unseen hand was pressing an invisible switch. It was also unusual that none of us caught a two pounder, as over the years that I've fished this particular pond for perch on average every third fish I catch weighs 2 pound or over, so it would have been reasonable to expect at least one of us to break the magical barrier. However, such considerations seem churlish- we had enjoyed a good, but challenging, day's fishing and the pleasure of continuing to add new memories to those which are already imprinted on our minds and a part of our fraternal folk lore in our fifth decade of fishing together is itself more than ample reward. 

I suspect that for as long as the Lord spares us and our health allows us, every year new plans will be hatched, new venues visited and new stories created. Rumour has it that next year carp may be the quarry.