Pesistence, Patience, Perspiration Pay off for Perch

I have had thoughts that some of my blog entries are far too long, tending towards tedious. So this one will be a little shorter:


Begin:  
Woodpigeons, robin, rat, crows, jackdaws, sparrowhawk, kestrel, tufted duck, mallard with young. A pair of peas in pod perch.





A Perch

Same Fish, Another View.

End

It's Fishing...But Not as We Know it. (Part 1).

I had a fairly good end to the conventional open season for coarse fish, a couple of dozen pike, and some nice perch over the last couple of weeks. The largest of the pike was about 15 pounds, a good fish for the water, and took a lobworm aimed at its stripey companions. Playing the fish, once I had realised it was no perch, was all a bit heart in mouth stuff.  No wire trace, 4 pound line.  All very pleasing when the fish was in the net.  The fish, both perch and pike, appeared NOT to have spawned yet, which, considering the warm weather we have had this winter, seems a bit odd, especially in a shallow water venue. Neither did they yet seem to be overburdened with spawn, and the spawning event for both perch and pike, in mid March, still looked to be a good couple of weeks away.  I sometimes find early close season a difficult time in which to catch fish.  Late close season is very much spent avoiding bream, as I do not like to catch them with all the lumps and bumps, and that rough touch  that comes with male bream getting ready to spawn.   The tubercles, and  other features make the fish actually feel and look ill as I touch them.   Far better to leave them alone.  Managed a rather nice photo of this handsome male goosander.  It surfaced unexpectedly in my swim, and somehow seemed rather less shy than those I find on the rivers, where I usually see them.



Male Goosander on the Canal.

So recently, I had a birthday.  Happens most years. Past a "certain" age, birthdays become something to be avoided.  Another year's mileage on the old chassis.   I breezed past 60.  I had just retired and that the new found freedom overshadowed the big six - O.    Sixty two was no great problem either.    I had just started to take the company pension and felt instantly richer at 62.  Adequate compensation for the high numeric.  Likewise 65, when all those workers out there pay their taxes purely to fund my fishing bait.  So 65:  not a problem .  No, the problem age is sixty eight.   That is the number at which you realise you are nearer to seventy than sixty five.   And there is nothing you can do to remove the feeling.   You can ignore it, but not remove it. 


My son added to the horror by sending me a birthday card.  A card that he littered with just about every fishy pun he could find. I shall not risk losing friends and readers by repeating them all here, but see no reason why you should not suffer one or two that I had not heard before:  "Re-inventing the whale" for instance.  And I had heard "For Cod's Sake!" before, but not the more subtle "For God's Hake!"  That one is quite a gudgeon.   But enough of that.  My wife had also recently intercepted an article of fishing tackle I had bought on Ebay.   She then wrapped it in gift paper and gave it to me as a present.   Sneaky!  And possible grounds for divorce.


Going into Sainsbury's recently I found the loo out of order.  A note pinned to the door said "Sorry for the inconvenience"   I kid you not.   So I had to go across the road to ASDA.   I don't like ASDA.  They have a long escalator to get up into the shop.   I don't usually mind escalators, but this one is different.  The hand rail moves slightly faster than the stairs.  I stand on the bottom step, rest my hand on the rail, and as I ascend, because my hand is moving slightly faster than my feet, I am slowly tilted forward, bit by bit, until at the top I am leaning about 20 degrees, and am within a midge's of falling flat on my face.  Who designs these things?  How could they risk life and limb in this way?  Yes, I know I could shift my hand, but that would be no fun at all.  ;-)   As an aside, the next time in ASDA, the up escalator was broken, and I had to walk up it.  I don't know why, but the visual impact of walking up a stationary escalator was quite weird.  I felt a bit strange.  Maybe it was linked to all those parallel shiny metallic strips. It seemed to have a sort of optical illusionary effect on me.


So why all this mini rant?   Well I needed rather more than the impending close season to justify a fishing trip abroad. Grasping at straws. An escalation of my real reasons for going fishing. My wife also spotted an article in the Daily Mail's web site about fishing in Thailand and jokingly said I should go there to catch "some real fish".  I think she was somewhat shocked, when, three days later, I was in a taxi heading towards the airport.   Birthday, escalators, close seasons: what better excuse for a trip abroad?


In the UK I never fish commercial waters.  At least I never have to date.  I just don't like the idea of them.  The fisheries in Thailand are certainly a type of commercial.  Exotic fish species swim in them, but they are very much commercials.  I have never thought that UK commercials amounted to real angling.  I know many carp anglers will disagree, and they will no doubt similarly disagree with me about the fishing in Thailand.   It is fishing...but not as we know it.    I think the best I can say is that from my point of view it is fishing...but it is not angling.   To me angling implies a degree of art and skill.   I cannot really say that angling in Thailand at these fishing resorts qualifies as skilful.  There are too many rules to follow, individuality is not approved of, and with very minor differences, everyone at these resorts fishes with similar tackle, similar methods and similar bait. You are largely TOLD how to fish, so what you catch is more down to them, than it is to you. This is understandable, for the exotic fish the waters contain do not come cheap, and have to be protected from maverick anglers, and it means that rules have to be imposed so as to offer a degree of protection to the fish.  So in order to be able to stand the process I had to accept most of the rules. I understood all that before leaving the UK, and as long as I could consider the fishing as being  "happy hour" stuff, playtime,  I was content.  Had I wanted to fish in a way wherein my angling skills would be tested, I would never have got as far as a boarding pass.  This is not to say it was not fun: getting a bend in the rod and an ache in the arm is what it is all about in Thailand.   To fish for these exotic species "in the wild" would have entailed great expense, a major expedition, exposing me to considerable danger and disease deep in the Amazonian jungle.  The only way Joe Bloggs is ever going to be able to fish for species such as arapaima, at an acceptable cost, is to visit one of these angling resorts.   In much the same way as the only way most carp anglers are able to fish for 40 pound plus fish, is to visit a commercial water, possibly even one such in France.


How the resorts manage to get licenses to stock waters in Thailand with exotic, predatory species from South America is something of a mystery.  I have to put it down to lax environmental departments, the wish to encourage tourism at all costs, and maybe a lack of any realisation of how much damage these fish might cause if they escaped into the wild.   After all the Thailand climate is sufficiently similar to Amazonian conditions that we can be certain the escaped fish would breed, probably prolifically.

 

I was as attracted by the wildlife as much as by the fish on offer, and although the number of species present (seen?) was less than I had hoped for, there were still some gems that I would never find on the banks of the local cut.  Look at this flower: it is called a batflower for obvious reasons. I found it well away from the fishing lake, when I went for a wander.   It is probably too much a flight of fancy to suggest that real bats are involved in its fertilisation processes.

There were some interesting birds too, and I apologise if I mis-identify any of them.  This I think is a black winged stilt. Incredibly graceful once you come to terms with it having clockwork, backwards facing legs.   I suspect that what looks like a knee, is probably an ankle joint.

Another, much smaller bird, looked a little like a humming bird as it sipped nectar from the bird of paradise flowers that surrounded the lake.  It ignored me, enabling me to get quite a passable photograph.

I think this is an olive backed sunbird

These are open billed storks.   Common birds: I saw them in India too.   The one on the right has a small snail in its bill.   Snails appear to be a favourite food.  How the bird uses something that looks better suited to cutting drivers out of cars crashed on the motorway, to extract snails, without damaging the shells, I have no idea.  But there were always lots of empty snail shells wherever the storks had been feeding.

This next bird I am not so sure of.  If was one of a number of herons and egrets I managed to photograph.  I have been unable to find a photograph on line which looks exactly  like it, but perhaps it was a youngster, in plumage yet to be fully developed.  It was obviously some sort of heron or perhaps a species of bittern. My best guess is a Chinese Pond Heron.   Either way, this one was hunting a small lizard.  It didn't catch the lizard, as the bird was scared away by a lady needing the toilet in a hurry.   So my hoped for  pictures of bird with lizard did not happen, and the bird missed out on its lunch. A stunning bird though. The second picture is an adult Javan Pond Heron, and is probably a closely related species.

Chinese Pond Heron??



Javan Pond Heron



Oriental garden Lizard

This was the lizard that the heron was hunting.

After resting a while, a good ten minutes of sunning itself on the handle of my rod, it suddenly dived into the undergrowth. Moments later, two herons appeared and stood over the spot where the lizard had hidden itself. It was at that point that the lady intervened in the little tale.  I think it to be an oriental garden lizard. 



Water Monitor

Much bigger, at about five feet long, was this water monitor.   It crawled out from waterside vegetation, ambled along a pathway, and took to the tree once I started to chase after it, camera in hand.

Snakes were around but quite hard to find.  Only saw two, one being far too high up in a tree to try and photograph it.  I felt there was no point in waiting until it came back down, snakes are amongst the most patient of animals, and I am sure it would have out-waited me by quite a while. I said "out-waited" there, not "out-witted". I did manage to photograph one swimming snake: it was one of the bronze backed species.   As I photographed it a damsel fly approached it and landed on its head, giving me an unexpected but very welcome and perhaps unique picture.

Bronze backed Snake and Passenger

So, you may by now be asking: "What about the fishing?" 


Well, I am afraid that I found the wildlife equally as interesting as the fish and fishing, and so, in order to keep the blog entries no more than tediously long, the fish related stuff from Thailand is all in part two of this missive. 




To be continued in Part 2....very soon.








A Paucity of Perch and a Plethora of Pike

The day dawned grey.  The very ground itself looked grey:  the green of the grass being so muted by the time of year and the ambient light that colour would have been all but eliminated, were it not for a few brightly painted narrowboats in the foreground.  The sky was that shade of grey which you know is going to precede a snowfall.  The canal had a partial coating of cat ice, formed overnight, a very thin covering.   With the reflections from the sky, even that looked grey.  I caught a slight movement amongst the grey on the far bank, some couple of hundred yards away.  It wasn't grey, but a brown colour, yet as near to grey as it could be.  A herd of six deer.   I don't know the species, and although they are rarely so be seen in this spot, there are nearby red deer, and probably fallow and roe as well. These six individuals did not stay in view for more than a couple of minutes, but one by one jumped a fence which was over their head height. They did it so easily, from a standing start, up onto the hind legs and then they just sort of folded themselves over the top wire, making it all look so very easy, immensely graceful with no need for any Fosbury Flop or Western Roll nonsense. 

Deer at 200 Yards, and Some Very Active Moles. 

As the deer  disappeared into the woods, the snow started. Initially just the occasional tiny flake. These first few fell onto frosty ground, and looking closely at some that landed on dead leaves, it was possible to see the hexagonal basis of their shape.  Only a quarter inch or so across, yet on a molecular scale that is a hell of a long way.  And for a snowflake to have the six-fold symmetry that was clearly and visibly defying that vast molecular distance between the separate arms is truly a wonder. How does one arm know what the next is doing? Why should it look identical? I have read that for such symmetry to occur and remain as the flake forms,  requires very stable air, very uniform conditions at any moment, and right  across the space the flake occupies. Every small variation in that uniformity as time passes, leads to a different pattern of crystal growth.  So as the flake grows it actually records a mini history of the conditions, and the changes to those conditions as it formed.   Few flakes will be totally perfect in all six arms of course ( although many come close), but equally you would find it impossible to find two the same. For each has grown in its own short spell of changing conditions, and each records its own past from birth until it is observed. No two flakes occupy exactly the same spot in the cloud, so no two will have the same history. 

So it snowed, a couple of inches falling as I fished, layering the topside of everything: branches,

Snow

twigs, landing net, rods and me.  Just one missed run from a pike, but until the wind started to strengthen it was quite a pleasant morning.   A moorhen chugged past me, snow lying on its back.   It must have been at least as well insulated as I was but without the inconvenience of heavy clothing , boots and gloves.   Oddly I felt quite warm until I packed up just after lunch, when I realised that the typical English wet snow which lays so heavily on everything, does make me feel quite shivery, and I was quite glad to get back in the car.

The previous fortnight had been a little odd. A few frosts, but in general nothing too extreme.  But something seems to have got under the scales of the perch, in that I have stopped catching them.  Instead of three or four fish a trip, perch catches have dropped just to a couple over about five trips.  One of them was a nice enough fish at 1-14.    But it did surprise me somewhat by taking a pike bait.   This perch took an eight inch bream: quite a deep bodied fish, the bream, even at that small size. I swear that the perch had a gob even bigger than some of my Liverpudlian friends, and knew equally well how to use it.     How this specimen managed to take the bait and still have the strength to pull a fairly large float under, I just do not know.   I also have little idea why, during the next four trips the perch all ignored a four inch little rudd, a bait designed specifically for perch, rather than pike. 

A Lob Caught Roach Drifts in Towards the Net

 Having become expert at ignoring the rudd, they then became rather good at ignoring my lobworms.  The odd skimmer bream and roach still took the worms, but there might as well not have been a single striped fish in the entire canal system for all the signs I saw of perch.

Pike have proved a little easier to catch, or perhaps rather more difficult to avoid, with about 15 or 16 of them taking perch baits.  I had my five a day on two consecutive trips, although there was nothing of a vegetarian nature involved and so my waistline has remained unaffected.  Initially when perch were the target I had omitted a trace.   I figured that, as I was on a small single hook, any pike biting through the monofilament would not unduly suffer, and would fairly soon shed the hook.  But I was not expecting so many pike, maybe the odd one or two.  And the pike were not confining themselves to the rudd either.  Some of them took lobworms.  Believe me, playing a pike of perhaps six and a half or seven pounds on 3 pound nylon, using a light rod fitted with a centrepin reel was quite exciting.

The Lobworm bait is Just Visible, Curling Out of the Pike's Jaw

  The fish fought more like a summer pike, and with a barge passing by me as I played it, the drama and heart rate rose considerably and in parallel with each other. I actually shouted at the pike to keep to the near bank, and fortunately it did. It honoured and obeyed me far more than the wife ever has.  I would have been unable to stop the fish had it made a  determined rush for the boat's propeller.  On the other rod I had resorted to using a trace with the rudd.  No point in being really silly.

Playing that fish  came in very useful a couple of days later, when a rather good looking pike of a little over fifteen pounds also took a traceless lobworm bait.   This fish fought for less time that the earlier fish, but stayed deep and slow, and I knew it was a fair old fish.   Knowing that, and remembering the monofilament end tackle, really affects how one plays a fish.     The image of one of those 700 teeth cutting through the line remains in the mind the whole time.  There was one other double in my haul, a little smaller, and a fair mix of fish from as little as a couple of pounds up to just under the ten mark.

With a Flick of its Tail, Fifteen Pounds of Pike Vanishes Into the Murk.

   A wide size range, indicative of a good and healthy population.   One fish of about eight pounds though, had a damaged left side jaw.  An obvious fishing injury, one created by an angler who had no idea how to treat a pike, and who valued his lure or trace far more than he did the pike.  The jaw had quite a flap of loose flesh, and as I looked at it in the landing net, the fish thrashed, and somehow managed to inflict half a dozen small cuts in my finger and thumb.  The exposed side of the pike's jaw had also exposed a fair number of its teeth, which caught my hand. Usually it is not until the hook is to be taken out that those teeth need to be watched carefully. The next ten minutes were spent wiping the blood away.  The fish, apart from its wound seemed quite healthy, could certainly feed itself, and swam off strongly when released.  But I don't like to see pike injured like that.  Those that do not know how to handle pike should get a demonstration from an experienced angler before going pike fishing alone.   The pike is always in some danger, especially from those who still use anything similar to Mr. Jardine's old snap tackle.  A couple of treble hooks deep in a pike are not easy to remove for the inexperienced, and are likely to have barbs ending up near to the delicate blood filled gill filaments.  Barbless hooks help, but I do feel that multiple trebles are not a good idea on a deadbait.

I took a day off from the perch, as the rivers had fallen to an acceptable level.  Two rods, one for pike which proved to be ineffective, and a grayling rod.   Just the one grayling was to take the bait, but the trip was not wasted.   Something landed in the willow tree, just to my left, maybe 6 feet away.  My head automatically swivelled, and I saw, as it took flight, what I immediately thought to be a nuthatch.  Another second of observation though, showed that the orange/brown chest was that of a kingfisher, one which, having been as startled as I was, headed speedily back upstream.  Good to see one in February.  Still no good photograph though.

Tales From the Riverbank  (or Towpath)

I meet a fair few oddballs whilst fishing.  Maybe likes attract.  Yesterday a cyclist wheeled his bike onto the towpath near me, and settled down onto a memorial bench. I assumed, because of the time, he was going to have lunch.  He was, although I had not expected it to be a 500cc can of Boddington's.  Initially he was quiet, but then became noisy and rather over-friendly. It was obvious this was not his first lunch stop.  A young lad fishing nearby was initially the target.  Various phrases he used were as follows:

"I am one of life's victims."

"Watch out for the Chinese, they are out to wreck the UK"

" See him there ( pointing at me), he is above me".   I took this to mean that he thought I was a rung or two higher up the social ladder than he was. 

"I am a God"  This seemed to go somewhat against his previous statement, unless I too have become a deity whilst I was not looking.

"I am on your side"

He also made reference to a life in which cocaine had played a big part.

The young lad was half amused, half scared and pleaded with me not to leave him alone.  A friendly drunk, whom I dismissed as harmless, but I did worry whether he might fall into the water if he tried to get on his bike.  Luckily he didn't, but walked along the canal pushing the cycle, and shouting other phrases at various passers by.  It all helps to pass the blank days.

The other situation was rather odd too.   Over a few trips there has been a dog, near to  a boat on the far bank.   The dog seems to incessantly watch me.  It stands there, paws on the very edge, and stares at me.  For hours at a time.  Another boater mentioned to me that it was a fishing dog.   Apparently the boat owner, some evenings, casts out a pike bung, which the dog watches, and on seeing a run, the dog barks so as to drag the guy away from his TV, to get him to come out of the cabin and strike the pike.  The dog did seem at times to be watching my float!   The second boater mentioned that the dog's owner was a serious angler, who fished all over the world, and even made fishing DVDs.  He was called Pete Drabble, the eel man.  I said I thought I recognised the name Drabble, but  the eel man was surely Barry McConnell.  (Barry is fairly local). Ah yes, said the second boater, those two are great mates.  Coincidences all round: Barry fishes, or fished the Cheshire Meres for eels.   I did fish for eels myself on the Meres some years before Barry, although with not quite such spectacular success.  But the interesting part is that Pete has a fishing dog that gets him out of bed whenever a fish bites.  Is that not cheating?  I hope to see that in action one evening.  Life at times just gets very weird. It will be nice if it continues to do so.

Canal Zander and Other Stuff

We do not have any zander in the local canals. I can say that with 99.99% certainty. No zander, zilch zeds, zero...well near zero. That missing 0.01% is due to a single rumour I heard of one being caught a couple of years ago.  So far from any established zander populations though, that, if the rumour be true, it must have been a fish introduced by a zander angler, and caught elsewhere.  Since that rumour, all has gone quiet.   I mention this because I have read elsewhere that the Canal and Rivers Trust are seeking £5000 or so in order to try and eradicate, (or at least reduce the numbers of) the

A Tiny Zander From the Coventry Canal

species from the Coventry Canal. The Coventry Canal has plenty of zander, I even caught a few myself during a couple of day trips last year.  Nothing big, but if I can catch several without having spent much time down there, then they are present in good numbers.    I had been shocked a year or two before, when I caught my first ever zander, on the Trent. Never seen one before and I had no idea they were present. Thirty odd years away from angling and the grapevine withers.  A subsequent trip to the river with the specific intent to try for a zander was successful. So the Trent is another river in which they must be present in considerable numbers.

There is an infinitesimally small chance that such eradication tactics will work in Coventry. The species is far too well established for any control efforts to work.  Short of draining the canal, and/or killing all its fish, they will remain.  Even if removed, they will soon return from elsewhere in the system.  There are too many connections between canals ( and other navigable waterways) for that not to be the case.  It is far too late.  When those 100 or so fish were first introduced into the Great Ouse Relief Channel back in 1963, the wide spread of zander was guaranteed by their first successful spawning. It was an inevitable consequence.  I remember an article in "fishing" magazine some forty five or fifty years or so ago, wherein pike livebaits were being retrieved with V shaped marks on their flanks and no-one knew why.  I think that was on the Forty Foot Drain.  Soon afterwards the first zander were being caught, and held responsible for the marks on the fish.   Reactions varied from wild panic to gratitude that another predatory fish was there to be enjoyed.   The authorities were not happy, and a cull was attempted back in about 1980/81 on the Middle Level.  It was felt that silver fish were suffering badly. They reduced the numbers of both pike and zander, stocked roach, thus reducing the ratio of predators to prey, It worked for a while, but subsequently good breeding years allowed numbers of predators to once again rise.  An experiment doomed to fail long term, as will any new attempt to control the species.   I have no idea why the decision was first made to stock those 100 fish into an unenclosed water.   Looking back there must be those that have regrets.   The EA, the Canal Trust and others must regret that first introduction into the Channel.  The human race is unlikely ever to learn.   Cane toads, American crayfish, mink, balsam, hogweed, knotweed, wels catfish, topmouth gudgeon, ide, carp,  goldfish, all are chapters in a book that should be compulsory reading for anyone bringing any species into an alien environment.  And yes, I did say carp then.

We do not have zander in the local canals....but they sure as hell are on their way.  And as has happened with carp over the last forty years or so, anglers will be in the forefront of helping zander to spread. I don't approve of such behaviour, but the natural spread is unstoppable, and it matters little whether  I approve of that or not.   Uphill lock flights may help to delay the spread, but sooner or later, even these obstacles will be passed.    I once caught a flounder in the Shropshire Union canal.  It had come up from the River Dee, working its way uphill and through a number of locks in the process, probably quite difficult for a bottom living fish.   In a few years zander will find their way back down that same set of locks that the flounder had negotiated. And once here I will fish for them locally, and as with perch and pike, I shall return them alive.   It makes little sense not to.

Of course, zander are not the only thing that has happened to our canals over the last 50 years or so. My first serious fishing, from probably the age of twelve, was on a local canal.  It was very clear, and a hard water to fish.   Its clarity meant that you could watch maggots sinking.  Throw in a handful with your hookbait and you could see the roach and perch rush in, taking every maggot but one.   But I learned to catch those fish, and the canal in turn taught me how to be an angler. I mainly fished for the roach, catching many a fish between eight and twelve ounces.   Pound fish were rare, despite the bailiff claiming that he caught many a two pounder, and several over three.  My friends and I never believed him, never saw him fishing, never saw a photograph.  Had such fish been present we would have caught at least the occasional one.   But over several years I only had three fish over a pound, and was well pleased with the best at 1-6.   The bailiff sold the day tickets, probably on a commission basis.  Make of that what you will. I neither saw nor caught a perch of a pound or more: they just did not seem to be there.   

 

Another change is that much of our canal banking is now protected by metal shuttering driven into the banks.  It helps prevent erosion caused by the wash of boats.  I assume it is due to boat speed rather than numbers.  When the barges were horse drawn canals never seemed to need the metal shutters.  I feel that these metal edgings have contributed to the demise of the water voles: animals which I used to see daily.  There is no longer the bankside mass of reeds and rushes along both banks.  There is probably less food for the fish in consequence. The voles have nowhere to hide, little to feed on and no way of migrating along the canal system any more.  Mink may have had an effect, but I am sure they are not wholly to blame.

 There are now far more boats.  Fifty years ago "my" canal had about half a dozen boats clustered around a small boatyard. Last week I counted well over a hundred narrowboats and canal cruisers in the same spot.  A short distance away is another boatyard, one of several new ones that have been built.  As I fished last week, I admired the skill of one bargee, who turned his 60 foot long narrowboat through 135 degrees into his regular mooring.  He used minimal speed, few engine revs, but great control and slid in alongside his jetty beautifully. I was impressed.   Later a much shorter boat attempted the same process and made a right old signal crayfish of it.  The "captain" collided with other boats and jetties, surged to and fro, and gunned the engine at maximum revs for minutes before completing the task.  In doing so he churned the canal, or more specifically my swim, into large whirlpools, turning the water into a horrible black mess as the bottom silt was stirred and shaken. I moved.   But the end result of so many boats is that the canal is always a muddy brown colour, even in winter.     I used to see one or two boats pass by me during a summer weekend, now I see a dozen or so, even on a cold February day.  It must become unfishable during the summer months.

But is that muddy colour entirely a bad thing?         Maybe not:  over the last three years or so I have

A Canal Perch of About Two and a Half Pounds

fished five different canals nearby, none for  more than four or five trips.  Each of those canals has produced perch of two pounds or more to my rod, together with numbers of others over the pound mark.     My canal used to feel and look good, yet never produced perch of those sizes whilst the water was clear.  I understand many carp filled commercial lakes, churned muddy by the activities of those carp, also produce very big perch.   Can it be mere coincidence, or does muddy water allow perch to better ambush their prey, and hence grow much

Chunky Canal Roach

bigger?  I even had a roach of 1-4 from my canal this week!



Noisy Canal Nuthatch

All those local canals also hold plenty of ruffe, a species I never caught from them years ago. Ruffe must have used the canal system as a highway, and spread into my area of the country over the decades. One angler I know suggested that having ruffe in my canal was a sure sign there were no zander.  Another bemoaned the lack of gudgeon in the Coventry Canal.  Are zander predating so efficiently as to be eliminating these minor species form the waters?  The zander are now using the same highways as did those ruffe. Are my local mini species going to get a rough, sorry, bad deal in the future?  


I hear pike are less common in canals with zander. Is that competition between predators for limited food fish?  Or is it that young pike are also getting snaffled for a zander's brekkie?

Canals are indeed changing, but they are still greatly underrated as fisheries these days, and regardless of their mix of species, will probably always produce some worthwhile sport for those willing to spend time on the towpath. But apart from the odd lure angler, I see no-one on the banks.

Tricky Tench and Trivia.

Well, I am back.  And "Why have I not been blogging?" I hear you ask in your thousands. Well, I suppose maybe half a dozen of you might have noticed my absence.  One or two might even have have missed the missives.  I have the best excuse of all time: pure laziness. Writing has had to compete with fishing, sleep, and idleness.  I have not been re-papering the front room, mowing the lawns, repairing the gates.  Nope, and the more I have been out with the rods, the more I have stacked up to write, and the more momentous that task has become. But finally, a few words are hitting the page.

Since India the fishing has taken a couple of directions.  The arrival of the trout season has ensured a few trips to the rivers, with Salmo trutta as the target.   And a few fish have graced the end of my line.  Nothing huge, with fish to three pounds.  But I am not going to spend too much time talking about the trout.   Much of that was effectively done whilst catching them out of season on trips after the grayling.   And of course, once the seasons switched from coarse to game, the nuisance fish switched too. A few grayling were caught and also a solitary chub.  The chub did not look as if it needed the close season.   A very good looking fish, and at an ounce over four pounds ( I was unable to resist weighing it), my largest from the river for a couple of years.  A shame it did not really count.   Actually two chub...I have just remembered another one, maybe half the size, which intruded upon the trout fishing.

Cormorant Damage on a Good Sized Chub

    There seem to be few chub in the river these days.   Massed black death: cormorants, have seen off so many of the bigger fish, with goosanders also dealing quite effectively with smaller species. Even the common roach is a rarity, and I have gone whole seasons without landing one from the river.

So it was then on to the tench, and my first few trips were to a banker water, one in which I suspected I would catch a few fish.  After all, I had caught tench there in January, February and March,  so April should not be too much of a problem.  And it wasn't.  One trip produced 5 fish, to just shy of six pounds.   Despite their  heavy activity in the opening months of the year, they were still showing no signs of holding any spawn, which pleased me.  All fought very well, as tench invariably do.   But I did have a problem, and not for the first time.  On this trip I was to lose three other fish, on consecutive casts, and all to hook pulls. Were these the only three fish I have lost then I would have dismissed this as a statistical blip,  but I have lost a few other fish, tench and grayling.     Losing the grayling I can fully understand, the upper jaw of the fish is very bony and hard.  A hook in the upper jaw will very often have penetrated only a millimetre or so, and, regardless of it being a barbed or barbless hook, that hold is vary precarious.  A with a fish of a lively nature, such as is the grayling, a lost fish or two is to be expected. There have been days when I have lost half of the grayling I hooked, usually immediately, and it is part of the game, it is to be expected, rule 1.  But tench are different, their mouths are tough, but not so tough as to prevent a sharp hook, and most modern hooks are very sharp indeed when new, from taking a good hold.    And those three fish losses were not immediate.  All were lost well into the fight, as much as a couple of minutes having passed, before the fish was off and away.  I have no explanation for this.  I am happy with my hook choices.  Those fish that I did land were all hooked perfectly, with not a clue as to why the hooks had pulled out of other fish. I feel that I can look at a hook, and taking into account its size and pattern, be confident with my choice.   Other times, with other patterns, or maybe a larger size in the same pattern, I feel that the hook is not perfectly suited to the job.   But my lost fish over the last two season have not all been with one size or even one model of hook.  I am reluctant to assign the get out phrase of "just bad luck", but I can think of no other explanation at the moment.    

The grebes seem to have also been hit by bad luck.   They had been nesting on my previous trip.   This time they were nowhere to be seen, and a coot had taken over the nest site.   Which was annoying as, one day I had driven there with just my camera...no rods...not intention of fishing.   And the damned grebes had gone. Such is life.

Having sated the lust for a few post India tench, it was time to move on to some more difficult waters, waters in which the tench swim bigger...some of them.    The "easy water" has given me fish to 6-14, the others have all produced fish over seven.   In my past a seven pounder would have been seen as more or less unattainable, but these days I am learning rapidly just how far the bar has been raised, and so, despite my vow not to return to being an all out specimen hunter, I have the chance to catch these huge fish with a more leisurely approach.    So water number one, a fair sized reservoir was home for a couple of nights.   The tench were partying elsewhere and my efforts were to be rewarded by a solitary male fish of about four and three quarter pounds.    I lost another fish, a carp which on being hooked came up seven feet or so to the surface, and with a large swirl of water, was away.    I suspect that it was never properly hooked.  It probably would not have been over about ten pounds, as I have yet to land a double figure carp in this water.   Swifts, swallows, house martins and sandmartins all made guest appearances over the water.    

Coot, Sitting on Huge Blue Feet.

Eventually I settled on yet another water, much closer to home than the aforementioned reservoir.  A water from which I extracted just three tench last year.  But their sizes promised much.   The first trip was an overnight session, in a new swim, and a very misty night produced just one small tench, probably less than three pounds.  A few fish were seen to roll, but I was unable to persuade them to come out and see me. In the early morning mist I did see a pair of the resident grebes perform the "penguin" dance.  A birdwatcher friend told me that the dance was so called. I have often seen pairs of grebes, alternately shaking their heads, occasionally dipping their necks down in a momentary preening of the back feathers motion.  But I had never seen the penguin dance, except on TV.   Both birds approached each other, and paddling away  like mad , chest to chest, they raised themselves up high in the water, bodies quite vertical.   Sorry no photo.     The coots, as ever, were being aggressive, chasing and squabbling with each other, often lying on their backs, kicking away with their ridiculous blue feet.

Coot, Being Aggressive With a Mallard

As I drove home along the motorway, I was surprised to see a pair of magpies, fighting on the hard shoulder.  Like the coots, these were lying on their backs, on the tarmac, kicking away merrily with both feet.  Something new, as I have never seen magpies acting quite so before.  "Two for joy?"  Far too often, I see things that are either too brief, or simply at the wrong place, wrong time to get a photo.   Hanging out of the passenger window, whilst driving at 60 mph pointing a camera, was a risk that not even I was prepared to take for you, the reader. So, in the absence of a "selfie", from said magpies, tough.

The next trip to the lake was to be a blank, just a dawn until midday trip.  Very few fish were seen, despite a flat calm lake surface, and a choice of swim that allowed me to see the whole lake.  A slow movement caught my attention though, and a three pound pike drifted slowly into the swim, a few inches below the surface.   Donning my polaroid glasses, I could see that it was many yards from any potential prey. But next time I looked, a second, slightly smaller pike had appeared three or four yards from the first.  They remained for an hour or so, basking in the sunshine.  As I watched them, I noticed something trapped in the scum at the lake edge, and fished it out with my landing net.  It was a cockchafer beetle....

"Yes, yes, I know!   I wouldn't want one of those in my underpants either".   

I thought it had drowned, but it twitched one of its legs slightly.  So, as I was not being disturbed by massed ranks of eager hungry tench, I placed the beetle on the handle of my rod to dry out, and brushed its back to clear off some parachute seed heads that had become stuck to it.  After an hour or so, it moved a little, turning around on the handle.  Eventually it flew off, rattling as it went.  I felt quite pleased with myself, having rescued it. But just take a look at those crazy TV aerials on its head.  The seven individual leaves on each side can by closed up from the fan shape by the insect.   Each leg has a twin hook at its end, and its grip on my finger, in the photograph, was very secure. A tornado would not have dislodged it. What an insane, superb creature.

The next two sessions both produced fish.  Simple legering tactics on the first morning resulted in two tench, a small fish of a couple of pounds and a very nice fish indeed of 7-8.   I was surprised that, given the very mild Winter, it was not bloated and fat with spawn.  Instead it was just a beautifully proportioned and

coloured fish. It has maybe a slight hint of being a two tone fish too.   Top secret bait, as you can see in the

7-8 Female

photo. (Note to the mat police: the fish was on thick wet grass, and came to no harm at all). The next day, also in the early morning I caught another tench in the upper half of the six pound range.  It though had a quite noticeable spawn ball, and I did wonder why all the fish were not at a similar stage of gravidity...gravidness?  Neither word passes the spell checker.  Another fish, which felt much bigger, or which may have been a male was lost to yet another hook pull, after an extended fight. I did not see the fish.

There followed three of four blanks sessions, in each of which a tench or few rolled right over my baited area.  I was surprised a little by the lack of bites in the presence of fish, fish that were obviously attracted by by bait, but, as ever, I would always want such events to occur.  Predictability would destroy much of what I seek from angling.  One session was a night session, float fishing in about 14 feet of water.   No bites at all...until about 11.00 am, when my float slowly lifted and lay flat.  My thoughts of a tench were soon dashed as a two ounce roach came to hand.  A large, probably very large shoal of roach had moved in and three more were hooked, on the drop, in three casts.   As I reeled the last one in, something grabbed it.  Pike, thinks I, but despite the size 14 hook, being already embedded in the roach, I thought I would try to gently bring it to the net.   I soon found it was not a pike, but a perch, with a 8 inch roach half into its mouth.   It spat it out as I looked into the clear water, but soon grabbed it again.   It struggled a bit, and I had to choose whether to strike, and hope enough of the small hook was exposed, or to wait and try to draw the perch over the net very slowly.  I waited until the roach was fully inside the fish's mouth and began to reel in slowly. Of course the perch ejected the roach and swam away.  Size: difficult to say, but well over two pounds for sure, maybe three.  Its stripes were really black, a benefit of life in clear water.  One rod quickly became a lobworm rod, and soon I had a bite.   But the culprit was a slightly disappointing three pound jack pike.

Eight Pounds Nine Ounces

Back to the lake for an early morning session in a new swim. 3.00 am start, and before ten minutes had passed after introducing a smallish amount of bait, two fish, probably tench rolled right on the money.   Very few other fish rolled anywhere, and so I sat, wondering why and how they could ignore my baits.  It was around 8 o'clock, long after the last fish moved, that I had my first bite.   A tench, to judge from the bend in

the rod, and a good one.   Two or three times I thought it had become snagged, but I suspect that it was merely swimming directly away from me, the pressure of my line in accordance with Newton providing an equal and opposite  force.  As it eventually approached the net I saw a huge flank, and knew it to be my biggest tench to date.   8 pounds 9 ounces.   It was well provided with spawn though, and would probably have not touched eight without it.    Would I have preferred it to have been 7-15, without the spawn?  Good Question. But the spawn did not stop it from demonstrating how displeased it was to be so disturbed.  An hour later, the indicator shot up, and the reel began to spin backwards faster than I could have wound it.  I struck and missed!    How could anyone miss such a bite? But as I reeled in a small roach

Super Strong Suicidal Roach

was revealed to have taken the bait.  I might have suspected it had been grabbed by a pike, but its scales were absolutely pristine.   It was just a very fit, suicidal roach.   I wonder what it thought as my strike brought it to a sudden dead stop, directly from warp speed three?  All quiet again, the only movement being from a flotilla of Canada geese with their young.  These geese appear to creche their offspring, and thirteen young were guarded by eight adults.

The guards did not deter the male swan, which now that his mate was on the nest, was attacking anything that swims.   Anywhere on the lake, even hundreds of yards from its nest, the swan was chasing anything that floated.  Geese, mallards, coots.  The coots were also with young now, and as I watched a jay flying very low across the water, dambuster's style, a coot flapped its way across the lake so as to try and intercept the jay.  Ambitious but brave.

The Fifteenth Of March

 March the fifteenth.  Close season on the rivers.  Time for all those barbel anglers to vegetate in front of the TV?  Or time for them to see what else night be swimming around in some of our UK waters?   Or perhaps something else....

The last week or so has been patchy, partly my own fault, poor choice of suitable venues. I had intended to return to the river to see whether the grayling would be as obliging as had been the trout a week or so ago, but the rain stepped in again, and the day after I caught the trout, the river was three times as deep and probably carrying ten times the flow. I did go to look, but it was very chocolate in colour.  So I spent a few days messing about on still waters.    

The first trip was to try for a crucian carp, on a water that produced them in quite large numbers for me on a couple of occasions last year.   This time was however a complete and utter failure, not so much as a twitch.    It would seem that crucians wake up more reluctantly than do tench. The lake surface was absolutely still all day, no wind at all, and from my chosen spot I could see 90% of the lake surface.   Only one carp broke surface all day.   No other fish at all stirred.  There was a heavy splash right at the far end of the lake though, a splash preceded by a loud cry of desperation a few moments before.  I had seen a carp angler wandering along the far bank and he had chosen to climb into a waterside tree overlooking the clear water, and to search for carp with his polaroids.   The tree gave way, and I saw him drop vertically, feet first, into deep water that I already knew was at a mere 5 degrees centigrade.  He managed to crawl out, and I could only imagine what he might have been saying. He was a youngish lad, and before being dropped in the lake by that tree, had been dropped off at the lake some time before by a friend or relative.   I guessed he had no means of getting home, wet as he was, until a pre-arranged time.   A while later the bailiff came and checked my card and EA licence. I mentioned the poor damp lad to the bailiff, and said he might expect to find someone cold and shivering around the corner.    No sympathy from this bailiff though.   "If he left his rods fishing by themselves to go looking for carp I'll endorse his card, I don't care how bloody wet he is."   Some days the milk of human kindness flows freely,  other times it has curdled nicely before being added to the cup of tea, and is then served up without sugar. The stillness of the water surface revealed quite a lot of bubbles rising to the surface.   As usual another angler said they would be carp, digging into the mud.   He was wrong, I think almost all bubbles seen rising, from lake or from river bed are nothing to do with the fish.   But on this occasion I was able to prove it to him.   I noticed that near to me there were about a dozen places where bubbles were rising. Two or three were near enough to the bank that the absence of fish could actually be seen.   Other bubbles were rising in exactly the same spots repeatedly,  and more surprisingly, at regular intervals.   I monitored one such spot for quite a while.  Every one minute and forty seconds (give or take a couple of seconds), a mass of about 50 pea sized bubbles would rise to the surface.  This was so regular, that I could have timed an hour quite accurately by it, should I have chosen to do so.  These bubbles continued in precisely  the same spot, at the same time interval, right through the day.  At just 5 degrees, I was surprised that so much decomposition gas was being generated. There must have been quite a large underground reservoir of gas, helping to regulate the bubbling. Not a single carp was involved though!  Most of the other spots were bubbling at fairly regular intervals too.

My next outing was to the local canal.   Occasionally, with just half a day to play with, a local water will tempt me and become my target.   The fishing was fine, and a few half decent perch were teased out from near some moored barges. None reached two pounds but all were very welcome.   My fishing was briefly disturbed by one barge which sailed past, crewed by what one might have described as  the epitome of a "dirty old man"..  He obviously had great  a sense of humour though.  His barge was named the "Nautilust".   Brilliant, and a pleasant change from "The Elk" or "Priscella, Queen of the Canal" and various other silly and sentimental  boat names.

I was determined to get out a few times before "March the Fifteenth", and I arrived at dawn a few days ago to fish a smallish club pond.  No idea of its fish content, but I had an ulterior motive for later in the day.   The

The Bream Pond

fishing was nothing to shout about, and although by the end of the day I had about twenty fish, mainly bream, none would have dragged a spring balance, kicking and screaming, past the half pound mark.  But a pleasant day with the sun shining.  Dave: if you are reading this, dig out those water skis. I finally found you a sloping lake!
Various signs of Spring were apparent.   A few ladybirds were crawling about.  Unfortunately they were all harlequins emerging from their Winter hibernation.   The harlequin ladybird is another of our invasive species, and is outcompeting some of our native species as it spreads ever further to the North.  The dunnocks were getting fruity, the male fluttering his wings at any nearly female.  A solitary lapwing was in its display flight, crazy aerobatics which were probably impressing me more than any nearby female lapwings. The alternative name of peewit comes from its call, rather than its insane tendency to indulge in such crazy flight plans.  One other bird flew across the pond.  Slightly zig-zagging flight, with angled wings. Although my wader identification is non too expert I decided that I must have seen a jack snipe, probably the first I have ever seen. For much of the afternoon I was accompanied by a little wren, which rooted and scuttled about in nearby low vegetation.  It took the odd maggot and had something wrong with its left foot. Not so much as to inhibit its feeding too much though.

Shortly before dusk, I packed up my tackle, because I wanted to stake out a badger sett near the pond.   I had groundbaited the entrance and nearby areas with some sweetcorn and halibut pellets, hoping to draw out old Brock as the light faded.  However my spending a couple of hours with the camera homed in on the main sett entrance, was to yield no result.  

 As the last traces of light disappeared from the Western sky, so the first stars started to appear in the East. One planet, Jupiter I guess, had been visible for some minutes already.     Also around this time, tawny owls started to hoot.   There were quite a lot of them,  although not much was heard in the way of the usual calls and replies:   tu-whits  and corresponding tu-whoos.      One owl,  which may or may not have been a tawny, made several cries, once every few seconds as it flew a northerly flightpath to the west of me.  I didn't see any of the owls. Normally when fishing at night I hear the odd tawny owls, and occasionally even see them, as shadowy shapes flying overhead, but on this night, with no fishing to distract me, I heard far more of their cries than usual, but saw nothing. Eventually as the temperature plummeted with the clear sky, I gave up on the badgers, and headed home.

With the rivers falling again, I had another couple of sessions, different river, similar result:  4 trout, no grayling, and one very good trout, certainly over three pounds, lost to a hook pull, after quite a long and exciting scrap.  I might need to try and re-acquaint myself with that son-of-a-fish once the trout season opens.   

I did re-acquaint myself with the Derwent one day. The EA river levels website had suggested that the water would be low and clear.   I got up at 3am to check.   The website had lied to me though, and by the time I got to the river, not long after 6.30, it was up a little too much for comfort, and was quite coloured.  I stayed for a biteless day, frustrated by seeing just 4 fish move:  one, a small grayling which rose in front of me, just as I reached the river.   Three other fish swirled on the surface, one midstream as I changed swims around mid-day, and two others, one in each of the two swims I fished, both fish swirling within a yard of my feet.  I saw none of these three fish,  my attention was elsewhere, all were good fish, and I can only guess that they were pike.   But yet again, the only fish I saw were very near to my chosen fishing spots.   Uncanny.

Today is probably going to be my last outing before that fateful fifteenth of March...probably.  As I walked towards the river this morning rabbits were scattering in front of me. The frost was quite intense, and the fields were quite white as I strode down the hill towards the river.   Nice low level, and clear, and I expected a grayling or two.   The first fish though was a 1/2 pound brownie.  A nuisance fish.  I have to say that, for, although I enjoyed catching the fish, it is still close season: so it was a nuisance fish...unwanted... unloved... but which was returned safely.  Another followed, somewhat larger, and the swim went dead after its aerobatics. Too noisy, that fish needs to take up something quieter, like synchronized swimming. I moved a few yards upstream to where a fast tail rip bordered some slower water.   Here I did get the odd bite, but

A Perfectly Plump Chub

they were very, very tentative.   But a chub a little over two pounds soon hit the net after a spirited, deepwater fight.  The identity of the fish established by the nature of the fight long before I saw the chub.   A while later a better fish, a very plump and pristine chub a little over three pounds. As I played it a male mandarin duck flew past, its colours wonderfully vibrant in the sunlight.

Mandarin Duck, by Dali

 I may have said this before, but, had I not seen this duck in real life, I would have assumed it to have been painted by Salvadore Dali, whilst on crack cocaine. In the absence of the male, even the female is spectacular. One other chub shed the hook a little later. Lunchtime was my deadline for going home, and a final cast hooked into a third trout, one of maybe a pound and a quarter.   Throughout the day, the "V" of the river banks had become a flyway for the birds, and  several other species flew past: a heron, a couple of cormorants, one female goosander, two dippers, several grey wagtails, and a flight of five small unidentified ducks.   Possibly female mandarins.   Throughout the day 4 or 5 mallards flew up and down the stretch.

Grey Wagtail

  In the trees were various tit species, blackbirds, woodpeckers,  nuthatches, and woodpigeons.  I was told last week by a birdwatching friend that, unlike gulls, woodpigeons NEVER defecate in flight.   I think I'll stick to fishing if that is what I would learn as a twitcher..

Finally back, or perhaps forward  to March the 15th.   What shall I be doing that day?   Well, the close season seemed to be a good time to go fish elsewhere.  So: March the 15th is big silver bird day.   I will be off fishing abroad, on what will either be a very exciting trip, or my most expensive blank week to date.   More to come later.

P.S.   For those of you who read about my drilling holes in the lawn with a Black & Decker...it worked!   I estimate at least a couple of thousand crocus flowers have appeared.

A Canal Treat and a Mystery Solved.

I have never been in any way artistically skilled. I cannot paint, nor draw anything that might be recognised by others for what it was meant to be.   I am not musical, and am in fact banned from singing for life.  A punishment made by my music teacher on my first day at grammar school, after I had stood immediately behind him as he played the organ during school assembly.   But I can appreciate those who are artistically gifted. OK, OK, I am insanely jealous!   The gay community always seems to produce a high proportion of artists, but it also seems to have some good comedians and wits.   Those who do not live near Manchester will not realise why I have titled this article so.    The gay village in Manchester is centred around one pedestrianized road: Canal Street.  The locals there often modify the cast iron street sign, even though it is some 12 or fifteen feet above ground level.   "Street"  is modified to  read "treet", by the addition of some white paint.      The local council consider it rather unfortunate that the first word gets similarly emasculated,   ( work it out for yourself),  and hence the sign gets frequently repainted by the council too.  The sign see-saws between its two incarnations.    I was also amused to be told that one year Liverpool Gay Festival had been entitled "Fairies 'Cross the Mersey" by the participants. I suspect that Gerry Marsden would have been quite pleased.

So the title of this post is part in homage to those witty individuals who live and love in and around the Manchester gay village.   The street runs alongside the Rochdale Canal, right in the city centre, a canal which these days does hold fish, and which has a set of subterranean lock gates, beneath one of Manchester's main thoroughfares: Oxford Road, although I have yet to be brave enough to go fishing there.  And were I brave enough, to fish there would probably have a negative effect on business for a number of young local ladies. So I steer well clear. 

Today I returned to the Llangollen Canal.  I would not be defeated by this water, and sought revenge for the blank session it gave me a few days ago.     Armed again with lobworms and a "big 'ook", I drove down there in the early morning and the first frost for some time.   It had created ice coverings on all the many ponds and puddles that the recent rains had left on the roads.  The towpath grass was white as I sat down at first light.  The weather was initially fine and still, no wind at all.   But it was not long before the first drops of rain began to fall.   They continued to fall until lunchtime, interspersed with the occasional bout of sleet.  All in all, with the cold it would have been a most unpleasant day on which to blank.   And by the time the rain stopped, I was still blanking.  This surprised me, for, from the moment I first cast in, my float was continually bobbing and running a few inches to the left, or to the right. It would not keep still for a moment.   Something was certainly interested in the lobworm.   But there was nothing I could strike at, and although I tried, apart from losing half the worm sometimes, no fish were to be hooked.  Maybe there were crayfish attacking the worm?  But none got tangled up in the line and as far as I knew, with a water temperature of just 3 degrees, any crayfish present would be inactive.  But, just as I was losing hope amid the rising frustration, a very good bite. And to quote many an angling TV journalist:

Rod, Pole and two Pound Perch.

 "Fish on".   The fish rapidly rose and splashed on the surface in the shallow water. It was indeed a perch, my target species, and at exactly two pounds a nice "canal treat" for me. The fish bristled its fins defiantly the whole time it was on the bank. Usually they refuse to raise their fins for me to photograph. A short while later another bite, which resulted in a bream of about a pound and a half.  So  maybe all the the bobs and bobbles were from small bream?   Both fish were quite pale, especially the bream, a result of living in water permanently brown and muddied by the passage of canal barges.  Nevertheless the stripes on the perch were quite clearly defined, if not intensely black, and some nice red in the lower fins.  A while later a second perch, of maybe 10 or 12 ounces gave himself up too.   

Daddy Ruffe

The itches and twitches on the float continued apace though, curiouser and curiouser, and at about 3 o'clock I decided to set up a second rod, and throw a couple of maggots at the canal bed.   Mystery quickly solved. It was not long before I reeled in a small ruffe,  the first I have caught for about 45 years.  Indeed, it was quite a pleasure to catch it. Nine or ten more ruffe were to follow in quick succession. That is probably more than I have caught in total during my entire previous angling career.  Ruffe were always very rare in my area.  This handful of ruffe came together with about three gudgeon and a rather sickly looking roach of two or three ounces, a fish which had a large open wound near the dorsal fin.   Cormorant? No. After some thought I concluded that the roach had instead most probably been attached to someone's snap tackle in the recent past. As I snatched the tiddlers a local guy passed by.  A canal angler himself he professed never to have heard of ruffe.  After describing one verbally to him, I managed, just a minute or so later, to catch  another and was thus able to show him exactly what the fish looked like.   Another name for the ruffe is the pope, no-one ever really calls them that though,  but as kids were always called them  "daddy ruffe".  I have no idea why such a big nickname should apply to a fish which never usually grows more than an ounce or two.  I have also heard the term "Tommy ruffe".  I just consulted the British record fish list and the biggest ruffe on record is a little over 5 ounces.   Whilst on the site I also noted that the British record stickleback is 0-0-4.  Just 4 drams.   I KNOW that, as I kid, I had one much bigger than that: a very gravid female that was about 4 or 5 inches long.  And I kid you not! The small reservoir from which that came has long been filled in and built on, else I might have nipped back to see if the fish was still there.  It would only have been about 55 years old by now. but could I ever have overcome the embarrassment of claiming a record stickleback?

But the mystery of the niggling little bites was solved, and in, I must admit, a most pleasant way.  It was good to catch some ruffe, a fish that I have not seen for so very many years.   As I sat there, for the final hour or so, I began thinking.  maybe I could make good use of the prolific ruffe in the canal.    I re-tackled, and set up a new arrangement of end tackle:   float,  line down to that "big 'ook" and more line down to a couple of BB shot.  Very much like a cross between a drop-shot rig and a paternoster.   The paternoster dropper being of zero length.  The idea was that the ruffe would probably continue to molest the lobworm, now suspended six inches above the canal floor, causing lots of movement and vibration in the coloured water.  Then maybe, just maybe, the perch would notice all the commotion and saunter along to investigate.  I cannot be sure whether the theory worked in the way I planned, but the next 30 minutes, shortly before dark, did lead to two more perch being landed, one small, the other of a pound and a half.  So maybe it did work.

During the day I had seen no fish rise at all,  the only rings on the bright water had proved to be the droppings from woodpigeons in the trees above.   But oddly, as I drove across the canal to leave, a glance to the left showed a fair fish splashing on the surface.   I of course, had fished to the right.  But in very cold conditions to catch about twenty fish of four different species had made the trip worthwhile.