Old gold - part one.

Obsession has been my fuel the past hazy few months as the country has burnt crispy in the incessant heat of June, July and August. This obsession was born long ago and it's something I ruminate on traditionally over the long cold winter planning for the summer months. You see I think I am inclined as an individual to always dream of the seasons to come for some reason. For example, when it's hot I dream of cold crisp mornings and winter fishing for chub or pike; whereas on a cold winter day when I can't feel my hands I cannot help but think of baking hot days and summer fishing for tench and crucians. I don't know whether it's because I am a natural dreamer or whether it is simply because I am English that makes me like this. Whatever the reason, I know that this winter just past I dreamt of nothing but massive ancient old crucian carp. So much so that I feel sure that if telekinetic power is real then I cleared several spots of debris ready for fishing in summer through January alone just by thinking about them as much as I did.

I suppose that if you are reading this then by now you'll have a good idea of where this is going and what I have been doing since the start of this season and you'll have realized that by 'old gold' I mean the few rarest of fish that inhabit Napton reservoir. The whole situation seems this year to have been intensified by my failure last year to bank even one of those precious crucians I so much desire and seeing others catch one here or there was a very bitter sweet experience indeed.

The start of my obsessive campaign was an odd one as not long in I actually caught a crucian carp and quite a big one at that. But this elating experience left me in a unexpected position of target achieved very quickly. It was at this point when I suddenly found myself thinking, do I just leave it here and go and do something else, or do I actually take that as a win and follow the path of obsession for the summer and try for more. Even after catching my target so quickly it seemed too much of an anti climax to walk away at this point and even knowing how fruitless the summer might be crucian wise I made my decision to go with it and continue to obsess, safe in the knowledge that I had already caught and therefore could not fail from this point on. So with a crucian in the bag I went headlong onto this campaign to try and catch another crucian carp from Napton and thus spent most of my summer watching a float bobbing around in the clear margins of this moody venue.

I think that the fact that I adore tench fishing, love catching them on a float even more and that they are most of what you catch in this venue is a rather happy coincidence for me, and this tends to keep me pretty occupied as I angle after a crucian carp throughout the summer months. How many tench I have caught over the last three months or so is unknown. If I was to say on a bad session catching two or three might be about right and on a good day ten to fifteen is quite common, then I am sure it would be about right. I suppose therefore given the shear amount of sessions I have done this year then hundreds of tench have fought hard in the margins under my bent rod.

I have grown to love my 15' Greys Toreon rod so much this summer

I must have seen every sort of tench that swims in this water, from big females to tiny males. Happily I can say it seems that Naptons tench populations are in a very healthy state; even with some of the older fish looking a bit battle scarred there are loads of pound plus fish both home grown and stockies coming through to replace them.

One of the best captures of this campaign has to be a huge male tench, which along with looking quite young and very fancy with his huge fins, weighed in at close to six pounds. Now although I've always thought that old tome that female tench grow to twice the size of males to be a little of an over exaggeration, I do know that females grow bigger and this could point to there being some near double figure tench produced from this venue in the future.

Just recently I sat fishing at Napton and I spent some time trying to calculate the numbers of mornings, days and evenings I have spent at there. It took some time and brought back memories of all sorts of things, from seeing the otter chasing all the birds off the water, right through to the guy who thought the goose shit crusted banks were the best place to woo his lady. I've driven the country lanes so many times that I reckon my car could do it of its own accord. I've seen just about two thirds of the types of weather you can experience up there; from thunder storms to temperatures so hot that the air almost burned going into your mouth. And hand on heart it's been one of the best summers fishing I have had in years. I have thoroughly enjoyed it. Surprising to me as well is that I still feel as obsessed at this point as I did at the start, as the sun set once again on wonderfully tench filled failure of a crucian session.