The Alternative Angler – Wide Open Spaces

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.

With all things relating to fishing, it is the anomalies that I always find interesting. Take the very word ‘fishing’, what particular image does that conjure up for you? Is it the almost romantic notion of striding off into the countryside, harking back to our hunter-gatherer ancestry? The chance to be as one with nature, taking in the sights, sounds and smells, happy to become a part of the landscape, getting involved in the ‘great outdoors’ experience, so much so, that actually catching fish becomes almost incidental to your enjoyment?

Or perhaps you take a different stance, one where you go out armed with your cunning, guile and the very latest in technology to enable you to put a fish on the bank. The application of all this superior intelligence and equipment should practically guarantee you success. But if it doesn’t, will that mean that you view the session as a failure?

The basic question is, do you relate a session of going ‘fishing’ to be viewed as a target of having to actually catch something, and if so, why do we anglers appear to go about it the wrong way round, and deliberately make it hard on ourselves? And by that I am referring to stocking densities, a basic premise of our beloved sport is that you can’t catch what ain’t there! Yet, perversely, the venues that hold the most fish that are available for us to catch, ie, the commercial pools, are much cheaper (and more accessible) to fish in than the v.exclusive, v.expensive syndicates, that probably hold three or four fish in, say, 30 acres of water or four or five miles of river bank!

So it appears you can draw the conclusion that quite a number of coarse anglers are willing to pay more money for the opportunity of catching less fish, which must mean that they are happier just to be out in the countryside just fishing, but not catching anything in particular.

Contrast that with what seems to be the diametrically opposed expectation of trout anglers. I know trout lakes where you pay £ 10 for a day ticket with an eight fish limit, and as far as I am concerned the limit bag on those venues might as well be 100 fish for all the chance I have of reaching it. One, maybe two, if I am very lucky (jammy!) beyond that and we are in the realms of fishing fantasy. Other lakes nearby have a £ 30 ticket with a four fish limit, and here I will thrash the upper layers of the water until it resembles cappuccino in an effort to get at least a brace of fish for my trouble (and money!).

The difference between the two fisheries is stocking density of course, and by and large, with trout fishing, the more you pay, the more fish are likely to have been put in front of you, and in truth, that seems perfectly reasonable to me. But we coarse anglers are a bit more complicated than that. The greater the challenge, the better, and by that I mean the less chance we have of actually catching a fish seemingly makes it ‘difficult’ and therefore the eventual capture is more worthy, somehow.

And almost by definition, these ‘harder’ waters are the ones with very few specimens in them, so when these fish do eventually end up on the bank, it is only perhaps once or twice year. Now, if you are going to target one of these elusive fish, you can normally only do it if you join a syndicate, and having done that, you will need the very latest tackle and equipment, in order to sustain you in a state of constant readiness on the slightest chance that you may just get lucky (probably shouldn’t bring luck into the equation, skill and dedication are the only true path to success on these waters) this time.

That approach may work for some, but it certainly doesn’t mean fishing to me. I have had some of my best fishing days with no result, or at best, what some would class as very little success at all. What I certainly did get, however, was enjoyment. That has come with something as simple as stopping alongside the banks of Loch Lomond, on the long drive up to Inverness, going the pretty way, of course, Just as dusk was gathering, I grabbed a ‘smuggled’ spinning outfit out of the car and began flicking a Toby round the bay.

Not a hope of catching one of the legendary monsters, but just that opportunity to be fishing on such a water whilst surveying the stunning backdrop of a pink tinged sunset slowly cloaking the snow dusted mountains, giving way to vermilion, then gradually fading to a deep purple. Other travellers had stopped to watch, but I was fishing in it – what price that?

Closer to home, a snatched couple of hours on the canal with a four metre whip and two slices of bread, result three roach, biggest no more than twelve ounces, but again, given the circumstances, I couldn’t have been happier.

And, of course, the two, three and more day sessions in search of alleged specimens on difficult waters where nothing ever really materialised. Hours, days, weeks of and application (and not insignificant expense) on the bank that had yielded some memorable moments, but looking back, they were few and far between.

I have a horrible feeling that I have passed one of those age watersheds where if I think I am not going to enjoy my fishing, I’m certainly not going to go just for the sake of it – or is it just me that feels like that?