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 inan 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.