Pilgrim’s Progress

He is also a very keen angler, having come back to the sport in 1995 following a break of several years. In this regular column he will tell us about his progress as an angler – his thoughts about the sport, what he learns, the fishing trips he makes, the anguish, the humour, in fact everything he experiences as his angling career develops.

Pilgrim’s Progress – read it everyThursday!

Pike Campaign Underway – A Good Start, A Few Lost Fish In Between, And A Sad Story To End With

As an all round angler, I find that the diversity of each discipline or specialisation actually benefits the other sections of my fishing. Although recent PP’s have been very much devoted to barbel fishing I have also been embarking on my pike campaign. Last autumn/winter was a disappointment on that front. I had intended to fish predominantly on the lower Severn, but due to the extremes of weather we encountered, apart from one solitary trip, I didn’t getout of the starting block. I did manage a double first cast though,but this only added to the frustration of not being able to get outon the river.

So this season I started in September, and whatever happens overthe next few months weather-wise, at least I’ll have been able to geta few sessions in. My first trip to the Severn I fished at the mouthof one of the many tributaries that lose themselves in Britain’slongest river. At one stage, literally sat at the point where therivers merge, I had a rod in both the tributary and the Severn.Heaven on earth I thought to myself, fishing two rivers at the sametime.

A good start

Fishing with legered herring tail, I quickly had a fish. Weighingin at 4 lb 13 oz, it wasn’t a monster by any stretch of theimagination. But at least I had caught something, and there are dayswhen a fish that size would be a welcome relief. Within an hourthough, I was into something more substantial, and after a shortfight, a fish of exactly eleven pounds heavier made the unhookingmat. At 15lb 13 oz, it made me a happy man. I would like to catch ariver ’20’ over the next few months, and this was a good start.

My second trip, back to the same stretch resulted in a blank.However, it could all have been so different. The first run I had sawme connect with a good fish. I got the big female right up to thelanding net stage when I lost her. I always estimate my fish veryconservatively, so if I say that this fish was most probably a ’20’you get an idea of how bad I felt when she swam off without firstpopping on to my unhooking mat to say hello.

A fine line between success and failure

A short time later and again I missed another fish. This timethough it didn’t get to the stage of the previous one. When I struckI failed to connect. It’s very difficult to say, but it did feel likeanother good fish, although an attempt at guessing the weight wouldbe sheer speculation on my part. Still, it could have been all sodifferent. Instead of a blank I could be talking about a brace of20’s. The difference between ‘success’ and ‘failure’ in big fishangling can sometimes be a very fine line indeed.

But, as they say, you can’t keep a good man down and I was back onthe same stretch of water within a few days. Although I had anotherrun, it’s what’s known in the trade as a ‘dropped run’, so it wasn’tthird time lucky on this occasion. My bizarre affair with the animalkingdom continues however. For most of the session I had a crazy swanin the swim.

Every time I cast out it made its way out as quickly as it couldto where the deadbait hit the water, and craning its neck as farbeneath the surface as possible, tried to snatch the fish. I’ve againbeen attracting a herd of curious bullocks. But as I’m not bivviedup, on the trips I’ve made so far, I’ve been able to keep an eye onthem. One of them tried to eat my unhooking mat though, but I managedto retrieve it before any damage was done.

Take care of the pike

Although pike have a reputation for being ferocious killers, inreality they are very delicate and sensitive fish indeed. As suchthey need great care and attention from anglers when caught. Forceps,deep throat disgorger, unhooking mat, and so on, are essentials whenpike fishing. A pike that gets itself deep hooked can create realproblems for the angler. This is why early striking is essential.

Occasionally one hears of stories where anglers have got freelineddeadbaits out on extremely slack lines. This is not the way to pikefish! It is important to be totally aware of what is happeningbeneath the surface of the water. Even when I’m legering I’ll oftenuse a float as an indicator. Apart from giving a quick warning when apike is starting to sample the bait, the thrill of watching a pikefloat is, to me, one of the most exciting types of fishing. I lovethe tremble that often pre-empts the take, as the pike begins tomouth the deadbait. As the float starts to move across the water I’malready there, rod in hand, ready to strike at the appropriatemoment.

When an angler should strike is one that often attracts debatewithin the pike world. I tend to err on the side of caution and wouldsooner have a lost fish due to an early strike rather than one thatswallows the treble hooks and becomes deep-hooked. An experienced,and confident, piker will certainly know, even without being able toexplain it in words, when the right time is to strike.

Always use a wire trace

It’s also an extremely important part of pike fishing to use awire trace. I know it sounds obvious for those that already fish forthe species, but I’ve really been directing the last few paragraphsat those who perhaps wouldn’t fall into the category of’experienced’. There are still those stories that filter through fromtime to time of anglers fishing for pike with the terminal tackletied directly to the monofilament reel line.

I make all my own traces, and have never had a lost fish due toanything giving way, but particularly for a beginner I wouldrecommend either buying made up traces, or posting a thread onFISHINGmagic’s Forum for advice and help before embarking on D-I-Ytrace making. The Predator Forum on FM has some very experiencedpikers who will be more than happy to give advice.

A switch to stillwater

For my next piking trip, which now brings me into October, I wasforced to switch to a stillwater. Heavy downpours in this area hadbasically put the rivers out of bounds for a while. I tackled a localstillwater, where I had caught a ’20’ a couple of winters ago.However, I had done a lot of sessions to get that one fish. There isnot a large head of big pike in the water, but as I’ve so oftenwritten, it’s better to be out than not. I didn’t catch on thistrip, but I will certainly remember this session.

An unpleasant smell and no Barney to be seen

While I fished I noticed a very unpleasant smell. Looking around,I couldn’t see Gary Knowles anywhere. (Ok, that’s the end of thejokes, now it gets deadly serious). Some time later an angler turnedup in the next peg. Although an adult, he was a beginner and had onlytaken up fishing recently. As I was piking we got talking about thepursuit of the species. He then related what had happened a few daysearlier when he fished the pool. A couple of anglers (adults) werepiking, and every fish they caught they threw in the undergrowth todie.

He said that one had been thrown in the grass behind me. When Ichecked I found that this was so. In fact, this was where the smellof decomposing flesh had come from. I spent the next few minutes ofour conversation undoing the wrong thoughts that these people hadsown in the mind of the beginner. Pike are not some sort offreshwater shark that attack cattle when they wade into the lake todrink, bite the hands off people when they put them in the water, ordrag babies off into the deeps.

Education still needed

Pike have a very important role to play in the ecological balanceof a water. They eat dead, weak and diseased fish. They are notsilver fish devouring machines, in fact they eat their own, and theremoval of large pike (such as I saw in the undergrowth) actuallydoes no good whatsoever. I told the story to my wife when I got home.’Why don’t you report it to the club?’ she asked me. The tragedy isthat the club endorses it. Or at least turns a blind eye. That’s theimpression I’ve got anyway. Fellow pikers, there’s still a lot ofwork to be done educating other anglers.

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