Brothers of the Angle.

Once I'd got a few trips to the river in the bag, started to collect some more tackle and reach the point where I felt well and truly hooked, it turned out that a couple of of my friends at school were also taking their first steps on their own Angling Journies. So as the evenings got longer, a series of after school fishing trips to the local river ensued...often accompanied by one or other of our Dads.
Before long, we were in the Summer Holidays and as we had recently taken on a weekend home (static caravan) by the coast, Mum and I spent pretty much the whole 6 weeks there, while Dad left on Monday and returned from work on Friday evenings.
It was here that my path developed a fork, for I soon discovered Sea Fishing from the wide strech of coast nearby. Fortunately it wasn't full blown East Anglian long distance beachcasting, so my little rod (luckily was one of those combos that could be built in about 5 different ways) was good enough to land my biggest catch, an eel! It was only a reasonably small one and my Dad and his pals certainly made fun of me and my bootlace, but I was over the moon! Over the holiday, I'd discovered not only how to catch eels and flatties, but also dig my own Lugworm, which effecively made me self sufficient and also got me some boat trips, but more on that another time!
Returning to school in the Autumn was a wrench, but no time was lost in telling my mates how I'd been wrangling monsters of the deep, while they too had their own fishy tales to tell. And there it was, from the age of about eight or nine, we became Brothers of the Angle,our very own Cosa Nostra complete with hallowed copies of Angling Times that got passed round each week, and so it was all the way through our Junior and Senior Schooling with its long Summers. Brothers we remained picking up a few, losing a few along the way. New prophets came along in the guise of Dick Walker, Ivan Marks, Barrie Rickards and some were even met...although more on that another time too! Education finally came to an abrupt end, careers loomed for some, the rest of us got whatever jobs we could if we were lucky, and after a couple more years my family upped sticks and moved to another town in a different county so in a world without internet, mobile phones or email the Brotherhood inevitably drifted apart. 
Life marched on in its own funny way; I now find myself with a grown up family of my own but can look back and say I remained true to the spirit of the Angle in one way or another, with perhaps just a brief interlude here or there. Today I still find myself meeting new Brothers on the Bankside, in the Club I run and others I belong to, the ones I Teach and Coach, Famous ones, even dare I say dodgy ones! With the advent of social media, I have connections to Brother Anglers the world over...and yes, that probably includes you! And here's a thing... that special bond from so long ago, a bunch of small boys with scabby knees, wide eyes and big dreams never died...I recently managed to make contact with Phil, my oldest of these old friends, purely by chance. We met up in London one evening after work, had a couple of beers and a curry, talked about the old days and  generally brought one another up to speed. We agreed we'd have to meet up again soon, and...well you may have guessed what we did! Here he is with a Tench he poached on my rod!

So if you're lucky enough make a friend through fishing don't be surprised if you're still mates a lifetime later!


Tight lines

Sydders

Little Tinca...

It must have been very soon after my introduction to angling, I'd certainly only just turned eight, that I think the old man reached a little too far too soon...we set off one morning, quite early and when we arrived at a lake (turns out this was North Met Pit) we only had his rod?!!
"I'll show you how to catch a fish called Tench" he said boldly, setting up in his usual minimalist style, just a couple of shot and a 4" section of unpainted reed as a float. He explained the idea that when this Tench took his bait, the float would lift up in the water, not dart under as I'd become used to. Now this was confusing...but, I went along with it as a small boy would trusting Dad to know what was what. He cast his line, hand fed some bait and waited...and waited...We seemed to be doing quite a lot of this waiting lark, not like catching the tiddlers on the Lea, so after a couple of hours I suppose I must've been getting restless and a little bored due to the lack of anything going on.He suggested I go for a wander round and see what I could find, as there were no other anglers to annoy or disturb, so off I went. After some ferreting around, nettle stings and so on, I'd made a circuit of the pit. And there below me was the old man, sitting intently watching the little white float. On my way round, somehere I'd found a nice big flint, so there was only one thing to do...and the resulting fountain of water from his swim brought forth some choice new words I'd not heard before! I don't think he was impressed with my attempt to liven things up so suitably chastised, I sat down and was quiet and sullen for a bit. Sooner or later he said to look at the float - as if by magic it was lifting out of the water! How this could work I had no idea at that stage, but it just was as he had said. The ensuing scrap was not like anything I'd seen at that point, whatever this Tench thing was it had bent his rod right over! Skillfully, he subdued the fish, and hand landed it...he didn't hold with any of this net nonsense...and displayed the most gorgeous looking olive green fish with distinct red eyes and powerful fins, glistening in the sunlight. A sight I'll never forget. Looking back, it wasn't big, perhaps a pound or  two, but the biggest fish I'd yet seen caught in person!
And that is a memory that will stay with me forever - even now we still often laugh about that day.

Today, as an Angling Trust coach, there was a very good lesson for me in that experience, namely always have your young angler doing something, doesn't really matter what...if they're not involved and busy, they'll almost always become distracted, disinterested or worse still, go off the idea completely. I digress...

Back in the day, a three or four pounder was a very respectable fish, todays monsters going into double figures were unheard of, I suppose there were no carpets of leftover boilies for them to fatten up on, indeed the Godfather of modern specimen angling Dick Walker never in his long angling career caught a 6lb Tench!

And so as ever and in all things, our past shapes our future! In late Spring there's not much that I find more exciting and at the same time tranquil as an early morning, mist rises from the water as a fizz of tiny bubbles moves ever nearer your float, it trembles, rises and...well the rest is between you and the fishing gods!

Here's one from this mornings bag...

For an angler, there is just such a rich variety of styles of fishing, experiences to enjoy, places to see and rare and precious things we encounter that the piscatorially-challenged just miss out on. If there's one thing I hope to get across in my rambling, it's not to be be blinkered and locked into chasing just one species, be a specialist by all means, but get out there and taste the whole menu before you settle for your favourite. Develop yourself as a rounded angler (and I don't mean shape wise like me) and you will find so much more enjoyment over the course of your angling and be able to make the most of any  situation, not be limited because your usual target species isn't up for it on the day!

Beginnings...

It would have been at the age of eight that I first felt the thrill of a fish wriggling for all it was worth on the end of a line, although from an even younger age I'd been enthralled by my Grandfathers tales from boat fishing trips and a huge (well it was to me at the time) Monkfish, ugly as sin but the most exciting thing I'd ever seen!
Still got the old wooden centre pin he caught it on, but I digress...

Like many kids in the early seventies, I had to pretty much find my own fun; money was short, technology non-existant at least in the sense we understand and rely on it today...so tree climbing and falling out again, kicking, throwing or whacking things, secret hideouts in the woods, collecting various nick-nacks found on these adventures and so on, were the order of the day. Nevertheless a lot of fun, skinned knees, thick ears, chipped teeth and nettle rash ensued...activities surely if practised today would've got the parents a visit from social services at best!
One sunny afternoon during the spring of 1973, my Dad said something like "Fancy a go at fishing?"
Unknown to me, a pair of rods and reels (again, still got the reel, Intrepid New De Luxe) had secretly been bought from Mums mail order catalogue and paid for week by week (that's how we rolled in those days) and the following morning a trip to the tackle shop up the road providing all the other mysterious bits and pieces along with a tub full of maggots...which were great fun to a small boy!
Thus equipped, we set off to find the silver fish living in a particular stretch of the River Lea near what was the Royal Ordnance Factory, this closed at the end of the 80s and is now a housing estate...and the rest, as they say, is history.

Don't worry, I'll not be giving a blow by blow account of my every adventure, I simply don't have time or expect you to find them sufficiently interesting, rather here and there I'll recount some of my experiences and thoughts from the last forty odd years and onwards...I could draw on a vast back catalogue of interesting captures and fishy tales, but as
a) I never had a camera handy for much of my angling career (cheapskate) and
b) I'm not sure I'll find the will
...I'll most likely keep things current!

As an angler, man and boy, am I obsessive? Well if that's defined by the amount of time spent thinking about, plotting, planning, reading and reflecting upon the subject, instead of purely measured by hours on the bank, then yes, I guess I am. But I also have a day job, a family and all the other stuff men of a certain age can luckily sometimes find themselves with, so the time actually spent fishing is less than I'd like, but doubly enjoyable...and even forty years in, you never stop learning!

And am I single species angler? Nope, I love Old Esox with a passion, sure, but also appreciate most species for their qualities and individual beauty (ok, I've got to do something in the closed Pike season), I enjoy Coarse and Sea Angling equally and have even been known to chuck fluff when the mood takes me, although probably do less Saltwater Angling these days due to geographic limitations (or just being a lazy old so and so!)

Amongst the waffle there will be tales of all kinds of people and places, but I won't be naming most of them due to a desire to ensure you find your own hotspots and do your own homework (not to mention the potential for libel) and don't think you'll get me to tell you by email either, although bribes are a distinct possibility :).


I have no hard and fast plans on how frequently I'll be posting, so be sure to follow and you'll get an alert when something new comes along.


Before this turns into an autobiography, I just wanted to point out some of the differences between then and now, we didn't have the distractions and on-tap 120mph amusement found today - neither did we have the crazy Health and Safety driven risk averse culture, rod licenses, club controlled or day ticketed waters everywhere so in a sense it was relatively easy to fall into fishing. All your mates did it. Your Mum liked it because you were (hopefully) out of mischief for the day. More over, it was damned good fun!
Here's the thing...I started my Angling journey on a shoestring catching tiddlers...Roach, Rudd, Gudgeon and Perch and so on, of course now and then you'd fluke a better fish and be the hero for the day...it's how I learned, did the apprenticeship and earned the right to move on to bigger challenges. But all this time and so many big fish later I still take myself off for a days float fishing for the little silvers, I don't know but it's just such a no pressure carefree and genuinely relaxing thing to do!
Get out and give it a go, just keep it simple and take some old school tackle if you're lucky enough to have some,and if you have a youngster why not wrench them away from the Xbox and give them the opportunity... you and they may be surprised!

Tight lines and thanks for reading!
Sydders