The Alternative Angler

Never mind smelling the flowers, don’t forget to take time out to see the satirical side of fishing life and grab a laugh along the way as well. So here’s a regular column from Kevin Perkins to remind us that life is for laughing at, or taking the p*** out of, whenever we can.

I recently watched a fishing programme, in which a well-known pixie-like TV presenter commented that he considered his tackle set-up was nothing short of a ‘work of art’.

Looking around at some of mine, and indeed other angler’s swims, they seem more to resemble crime scenes, (just missing a chalk line round the body) or are perhaps the result of a small nuclear explosion.

However, in these enlightened times, this may indeed be considered art in some circles. But which school to follow? Shall we be post-impressionists, modernist or abstract. Perhaps we should seek inspiration for our swim layouts from Pablo Picasso or Salvador Dali, or maybe get right up to date and study the works of Damien Hirst or my own particular favourite, Tracey Emin.

Indeed the ‘Bedroom in a Mess’ look is one I can achieve without any effort almost every time I go fishing! So it may be that all anglers are indeed artists (yes, yes, I know that most of us are p*ss artists, but I am trying to raise the tone, for once!) and that we are creating modern works of art every time we go fishing. Now, I am not suggesting that we all take our watercolours and easels with us every time we go (not sure that Fox do carry bags for them – yet) but perhaps we should try to take time to ensure that our tackle arrangement is aesthetically pleasing.

The ‘natural’ approach is the one I adopt to my tackle arrangement every time. I arrive at my swim and just put things where they land, I then have to move everything again to get my rods out. The rod bags get slung on the floor, or if I am really organised, over the back of my chair. Then I empty out the entire contents of all the bags I have brought to try and locate the reels, which of course are always at the bottom of the last bag. Finding the rod-pod was easy because it is strapped to the rod bag, but whilst I was rooting around for the reels, I didn’t notice the buzzer bars or rod tops or buzzers, so I go through all the bags again. Of course, having set up the rod-pod, put the reels on the rods and threaded line through the rings, I am now going to have to go through all the bags again to find the terminal tackle. Having done that I can bait up (found the bait quite easily – amazingly!) and cast out.

I then turn around to survey a scene of utter devastation (sorry, artistic arrangement!). I know, I’ll put up the umbrella and then I can sit down, have a cup of coffee and sort it all out. But I have the usual difficulty in finding just the right spot to wind the brolly spike into the ground, but finally succeed. I eventually put up the umbrella, fix the guy ropes, and clear a space in the debris for chair and collapse.

I look out onto lake only to find that I can’t quite see the rods from where I am sitting! Shuffle chair around, no better, try to re-position brolly, but to no avail. Nothing for it but to move the rod-pod. But I can’t be bothered to reel in the rods or turn off the buzzers, so the bobbins are jumping up and down and the buzzers are going off, much to the neighbouring anglers amusement or annoyance. I go back to my chair and start to arrange my gear into some kind of order. Usually by now I will have trodden on the rod bags if they were thrown on the ground, if not I will just screw them up and sling them in the bottom of a bag. About now I decide on whether or not to assemble the landing net. I have a superstition that if I put it together before I start fishing, I probably won’t need it. If I don’t put it together, you can be damn sure I will end up shouting for someone else to bring over a net before the end of the session! Most of the remainder of the gear is picked up and put back into various bags and boxes, until the area begins to look relatively tidy. So I sit down again and pour out a coffee. Most people will tell you that the moment you have a flask in one hand and a scalding cup of coffee in the other is precisely when you get a bite. Not with me, that usually happens when I am about 25 yards away staring at a bush whilst relieving myself of numerous cups of coffee! Anyway, I sit looking at rods, wondering which buzzer will go off first (some hope!) and I notice that one bobbin is higher than the other. I can’t live with that, so out I go to level them up, again much bleeping from the buzzers until they are just right. Is it just me, or do those bobbins have to be level?

Indeed, when creating our ‘work of art’ does everything have to symmetrical, matched, balanced, or is bohemian approach frowned on? Do the fish know or even care if those rods and reels are a matched pair? (I know our shooting friends insist on matching shotguns, but if you are a game bird unlucky enough to be hit by the contents of a twelve bore cartridge, the gun maker’s name will probably not mean a lot to you!).

So I look around again, the bobbins still aren’t quite straight, my sandwich box isn’t closed properly and the contents are curling nicely, my seat still isn’t really level, I’ve put the cup back on the flask without wiping it first, several pieces of tackle that I definitely won’t need are still strewn around, the lid(s) are off the bait box(es) and the contents are either slowly going off or are hell bent on escape.

But all is not lost because what I have just created may just put me in line for a Turner Prize, and I could end up in the Tate Gallery.

Angling as Art? – more like Suffering for Art!

Read ‘THE ALTERNATIVE ANGLER’ every Friday!