Pilgrim’s Progress – read it every Thursday! Variety Is The Spice Of Life
Variety is the spice of life, or so they say. I’ve never worked out who ‘they’ are, but they do seem to utter pearls of wisdom from time to time. As far as fishing is concerned, I agree totally with the statement that appears in the title of this week’s Pilgrim’s Progress, which is why I chose it!
My first love is without a doubt, coarse fishing. But within that broad title there are lots of specialised niches in which people place themselves. Now let me say, right at the start, that I have absolutely no problem with that. If someone wants to spend the rest of their fishing lives after barbel from the Severn, carp from a particular lake and so on and so forth, I have no desire to criticise them. As long as we are getting pleasure from our fishing, that’s what really counts.
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| Stewart and a nice tench |
There seems to me, too much criticism in angling, for the sake of criticism. Live and let live, I say! If you want to form the ‘We only fish for chub of 5 lb, from the Severn between Bridgnorth and Hampton Loade, with float fished breadflake only, exclusively on the left bank, and only on Monday afternoons between 1.00 – 4.00 pm group’, then all the best to you. But don’t criticise others who perhaps don’t want to fall within your constricted limits. In fact, I’ve often considered joining a single species group myself, and have actually come close on a few occasions. The only problem is, I enjoy fishing for all species. In the last five years I’ve had spells where I’ve focused on specific fish, such as barbel, carp, tench, pike and so on. These times of focus have lasted from a few months to a whole season. If anyone asks me my favourite fish, I can honestly say it is that which I am fishing for at that time.
There have also been times when I have focused on a certain river or stillwater. And, again, for as long as that concentrated spell has lasted, I’ve been happy. But then, the time has come to move on. That’s the great thing about variety, it keeps one fresh. I’m as happy float fishing the canal for roach as I am legering a lake for bream. I don’t care if I’m on the steep banks of the mighty river Severn or stealthily crawling along the side of some little brook that you can literally step across. Variety is the spice of life!
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| Stewart – happy fishing for anything |
I’ve also done some fly fishing. In fact, it was a dabble with that branch of the sport that brought me back into coarse fishing five years ago. I was invited to join a small syndicate that had fishing rights on a number of small spring fed pools up in the hills of Radnorshire, in mid Wales. The main attraction for me was a 400 acre rough shoot, but as the fishing was included, I decided to have a go at that. After borrowing some tackle from another syndicate member I got well and truly ‘hooked’. I quickly got hold of my own fly tackle and gradually spent more time on the small pools than I did climbing the extremely steep Welsh hills with a gun. The two years I spent as a syndicate member were very happy ones. The pools we fished were all natural waters. The syndicate stocked them with rainbows about 12oz, but it was the lovely wild brownies that gave me most pleasure. A fish of 8oz, tracked down as it lurked underneath an overhanging bush, gave great satisfaction. In fact, not realising it at the time, my understanding of watercraft developed immensely. The water was ‘fly only’ and although that proved frustrating at times, the challenge was beneficial in the long term.
To complete the picture I also do sea fishing from time to time. Although I have made the odd deliberate trip to the sea to fish, most of my salt water angling comes as a result of being near the coast for work or for a vacation.
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| Stewart plunders the sea! |
Coming from a coarse fishing viewpoint, my first trip to the sea was quite difficult to get my head around. Thick stout beachcaster (no quiver tip!), 15lb line, 6oz lead, massive hooks and so on. And yet I was after whiting, and not big ones at that. I wondered how those tiny little fish would even register the bite on the rod tip. I was surprised, to say the least. A small 6oz whiting certainly lets you know it’s on the other end. Since that baptism (and no, I didn’t fall in, like I usually do!), I’ve certainly enjoyed the trips I’ve made since. I have fished the coasts of Cornwall, Devon, Hampshire, Merseyside and Yorkshire, as well as right the way round Wales from the Dee estuary in the north to Carmarthenshire in the south.
I personally find that being an all round fisherman is beneficial to my angling as a whole. Although there are different branches of the sport, I like to think of them as coming from one tree. It does sadden me when I see division in the sport that I love so much, and even more so when much of the division is unnecessary.
Maybe if we all broadened our outlook a bit more, became less critical and more positive, and respected others more, then angling would be far more united than it is. That can only be to the benefit of us all. One step that we could all take, is to discover that variety is the spice of life. Why not do something that you’ve never tried before in angling. Go on, be a devil……..
‘A Change Is As Good As A Rest’ is the title of next Thursday’s PP, where I tell you how I got on recently when I took a break from chubbing to do some winter carping. How did my two-nighter go? Check out PP next week to find out…
The Reverend Stewart R Bloor
Sedgley International Christian Ministries
PO Box 1216, Dudley. DY3 1GW.
Telephone : 01384 – 828033
Web site : www.sicm.org
e-mail : missionscentre@sicm.org
