Memories and monsters.

Everyone has important places in their lives, places that can be integral to who you become later in life. This is one of mine... I spent so much of my formative years fishing this small area of canal that I certainly got to know the bank side very well. I caught my very first perch sitting on a big square stone that I suspect is still  buried under the patch of black berries at the bottom right hand corner of the photo. My first pike fell to a spinner cast towards the big hawthorn bush at the back of the pool. I suppose what makes this place such an important place is not what I caught here but is instead what happened here. This where I learnt to fish!

Standing in the quiet of the morning I could remember right back twenty five years ago to when I sat being scorched by the sun and when my old boot sale special float slid away and a small spiny perch came writhing towards me. Waiting for my lift I pondered what my twelve year old self would have thought if he would have known what I was going fishing for on this day. I reckon I would have peed my pants with either excitement or anxiety if my twelve year old self new what I was about to catch. Saying that even having done this before I still find it hardly believable myself now at thirty seven.

My lift turned up and soon enough we found ourselves walking round the well trimmed banks of the fishery I refer to as area 51. Being the sort of fishery it is, it's not like any one area is better than any other and this I suspect is down to the repetitive nature of our quarry. I won't claim to any kind of expert on sturgeon fishing, especially as I've only done it a handful of times myself. What I do know from watching them in ponds and on this lake is that they pretty much constantly swim round the perimeter of whatever pool they are in. Hence fishing is as surprisingly simple as fishing large cubes of meat close to the bank.

I say it's supposedly simple but I found myself in that uncomfortable situation where my companion for the day Andy landed one within the first half an hour then followed it up with three more before I even got off the mark. Although I am suspicious of whether what I had been doing made much difference or not, I had been filling my inside line in with pellets and repeatedly casting to an island margin hoping to sucker one of battle ships in but had not had any response from any kind of sturgeon.

To make matters worse I had what looked like a decent Diamond back constantly parading within a foot of the bank all morning. I did all I could and tried my very best to be patent. Why they seemed so nonchalant about my baits was becoming a worry and that when Andy being the gent he is offered me some of the vintage flavouring he was soaking his meat in. CLICK! Next cast with the new flavoured meat my right hand rod which I had also brought in close sprang to life. Straight away in the shallow margin I spotted a very familiar tail. That meat had only done the trick and attracted that dam diamond back straight onto my bait.

It was mid-afternoon before I had any more action. All day long we had been watching the pools resident carp population going berserk on any free bait we threw in. Even on a man-made lake such as this seeing the individual clouds of mud pepper the surface as hundreds of carp hovered up anything food. It was during one of these fits of carp frenzy that I a big grey tail broke the surface of the water. I hardly had enough time to state it was heading for my bait when the rod tip buckled round and the buzzer sang the alarm.

What I think sturgeon lack in cunning they certainly make up for with shear power. Before I had chance to wind down the free spool it was off. I was just glad it was only us fishing in the area as this warrior of a fish smashed around the margins turning both our swims chocolate brown.

Eventually I got it under control and into the net.  It lookedto be a good fish. However it wasn't until we go it onto the matt and out of the net that something became evident. It looked suspiciously like Andy's first fish. A small but distinctive cut on the front dorsal fin was the main clue. But on the scales it weighed exactly the same. The weird thing was with this recapture was that when Andy hooked it first thing it fought like a wet sack and after only circling once went straight in the net. Whereas when I hooked it, it went ape. After realising it was the same fish it dawned on us both that we now had the same PB on the same fish!

Two days later I had myself a very early start and nipped over to fish a lake I haven't fished on in well over a year. I've been hearing reports that the tench had woken up and I seemed the right time to check and see what was going on. I arrived shortly after first light and found only one other angler already there. With practically all the lake free I was a bit spoilt for choice, but soon enough I settled onto a nice reed lined swim with the wind moving across it.

On most places my tench fishing is centred around ground bait, on this lake though I have had more luck fishing maggots in the past and so my attack was based on previous experience. To cut a long story short it was not an easy morning. Although the small resident perch of this lake seemed rather enamoured by my bait I struggled to find the tench. It wasn't until I deliberately increased my casting/feeding that I managed to hook into a small but excited male.

Seeing the upped feed rate seemed to have garnered a response I continued in the same vain until finally I hooked a bigger fish. This one ran me ragged diving into every possible bit of weed within thirty feet of my swim. For a heart stopping moment it did get pretty well weeded up. But by keeping the tension on it I gradually persuaded it out and into my waiting net. Given the clear water of this venue the colour of this chunky six pounder looked amazing and certainly made all the effort it took to catch her worthwhile. 

Even though the fish was in spanking condition one thing is a bit of a worry. The missing section of tail looked very fresh and worryingly like a bite or tear. There was even evidence of scratches on the other side of the wrist in the fishes scales. Unluckily this pool sits adjacent to another water coarse that is certain to have otters prowling its banks and although I've only just gone back and can't be sure, there seems a chance there may be something else after these stunning tench other than anglers.

Dinosaurs and dysentery.

The early morning smiles and elation of achieving my target had faded long ago. It had taken less than thirty minutes from the initial cast for one of my rods to stutter into life and sound a steady run. My strike had met solid and oblivious resistance from a fish which just plodded around the lake. That sedate fight too fast became a distant memory as the battle turned nasty and the sturgeon went ballistic unable to escape my constant pressure. The fight over, the fish continued its rage slapping me senseless as I tried to hold it for a picture.

Now though my day had changed... The action had slowed as the sun rose high in the sky and something was wrong,.. very wrong! 

A cold sweat crawled across my body and signals were being sent to my brain that indicated not all was well. I felt awful, like I had ingested a couple of live eels, one residing above my belt and the other below. I soon found myself in that terrible state when all your mind can comprehend is illness; all other thoughts had fallen from my mind. After muttering to my companion Martin asking him to watch my gear, I walked away from the lake sucking in air and wiping beads of sweat from my forehead, desperately seeking sanctuary. But at the end of the short but very long journey what I found was far from comforting. I've been to plenty of festivals in my life so have borne witness to some pretty inconvenient conveniences, but this one at this time made all those others seem like an en suite at the savoy. None of that mattered to me now, I just needed to be in here. Panic was now upon me and I fumbled at my clothes barely freeing them before waves of sweet blessed relief passed over my body. As if I had just taken a shot of heroin, comfort and euphoria coursed through my body. I had never been so happy to be in such a bad place as this.

Still enjoying the after shocks of relief I pondered how I had come to be in this position. Obviously something I had ingested was the perpetrator. Time, I surmised, discounted the previous days consumption so all that remained was today's fodder. Was it that sausage roll around ten or possibly the pepperami that followed it? Maybe Martin had poisoned that toffee crisp he had given me by way of revenge for me catching the first sturgeon. No, these were stupid thoughts as all that had come vacuum packed and still chilled. It had to be now to some microscopic germ that had piggy backed its way in somewhere along the line.

Air never smelt so good as it did when I stepped out of that fettered blue plastic hell hole. It was how people must have felt leaving some god forsaken solitary cell in prisoner of war camps. Even that momentary happiness was short lived as the sickness continued to wrack my body for the next four hours. The only thing I could imagine was how good it would have felt to be home, but my range was so depleted that even the end of the drive seemed too long of a journey for me to manage right now. All I could do was stick this out, let it pass and try to resist the idea of curling up on my unhooking mat clutching my guts whilst whimpering softly. This will probably be the only time I will ever say this but thank god the fishing was slow as inactivity was what I need right now, and inactivity I got.

Happily my episodes by late afternoon had abated and just as I was coming round the fish responded as carp after carp greedily forced my oversized chunks of meat into their mouths. Even in my weakened state I began to enjoy the day again and by the time the next sturgeon, a small diamond, turned up the colour had returned to my recently pallid skin and I could smile again.

Having stuck with one particular line all day I was rewarded with a third and final sturgeon not long before we left. Though this one was to turn out to the hardest battle by far. I have read that these prehistoric fish are one of the hardest fighting fish in freshwater and as my bite indicator went off I was about to have this confirmed. Dehydrated and weak I took it easy as the fish just circled round endlessly, but this could have gone on forever as far as the fish was concerned. More pressure meant more fight and more thrashing! I've thought about how to describe how these fish fight and the best I can come up with is it's like a cross between a barbel and a pike. 

Eventually it went into the net and I won't deny that in my state I was relatively happy about that, but I was even more happy to land my second decent sturgeon of the day. Which once again gave me heap of hassle on the mat just to finish me off for the day.

The next day I was wrecked! Both the illness and the fishing had taken their toll on me. Lying of the sofa I did crack a wry smile at the thought of retuning as there are fish four times the size of my biggest in those lakes and I really fancy a tussle with one of those monsters. Although I think from now on I will call an end to all bank side picnics for the foreseeable future.