Richard Walker – Three Glorious DecadesJust prior to the birth of Angling Times in 1953, Colin Willock, the first editor, was given the job of acquiring the services of a list of contributors who would be vital for the success of the fledging newspaper. Top of that list of course was Richard Stuart Walker.Walker’s groundbreaking book: Stillwater Angling, had just been published. In addition, only the year before, Walker had captured the record carp from Redmire Pool, an almost unbelievable monster of 44 lbs. Willock asked Walker if he would write a weekly column on fishing in the new newspaper. Walker doubted if he could do it. Where was he going to get the material? Not only that, he was concerned that the £ 10 a week he was offered to write the column was probably too much. He didn’t think Angling Times could afford it! But eventually a deal was struck and the first installment of a wonderful 30 years of angling journalism appeared in the first issue in July, 1953. This is the first article in the column known as Dick Walker’s Pitch “There has been a lot of interest shown lately in night fishing in general and electric bite alarms in particular. I’ve been asked for some advice on both from anglers new to the game; here it is: There is no point in fishing at night unless conditions are right for it, carp and tench, for example, don’t feed at night just because it is dark. In waters that are heavily fished in the daytime, you may have to wait until other people have stopped scaring the fish before you can catch one. The more common reason for fishing at night is that it has been too hot during the day for the fish to feed. If it hasn’t, and the fish have fed well during the day, you won’t find night fishing very profitable. Even when conditions are good for night fishing, don’t run away with the idea that you’ve only to fish at night to be sure of connecting with a big carp or tench. For some reason, a queer idea has got about lately that night fishing is easy, though I have never heard anyone who had tried it saying that. Actually, you’ll find that not being able to see very much is a considerable handicap, and if you are after carp or tench, you can’t use lights because these fish are scared by them. I say you can’t use lights, but of course you have to use a dim one, turned away from the water to bait your hook, and you’ll do well to use that as little as possible. A good torch helps when you have to net a really big fish of course, but if you use it you seldom get another run. Trout seem hypnotised by lights, but roach, rudd, bream and crucian carp don’t appear to take much notice of them. Another thing: it’s difficult to know how far you have cast at night, but a piece of silk or something of that kind, tied across your line, helps. You put it on by daylight of course. Incidentally, on the first outing at least, you should always take up position and arrange your gear before it gets dark. Then you can memorise where the weeds and snags are, and get your direction from the skyline opposite. There are lots of ways of detecting bites in the dark, and the buzzer or electric alarm, is only one amongst many. I doubt if any more fish are caught when electric alarms are used than would be with indicators like silver paper around the line, or spoons balanced on saucers, or a dozen other non-electrical devices anglers have thought of in the past. The first problem a buzzer poses is what it means when it goes off. A signal doesn’t mean a fish necessarily. It might be wind or drift, or a bat or moth hitting the line. And even if it is a fish, it might not have taken the bait. It might have just brushed past your line, or just pulled at the bait and dropped it. Or a lot of small fish knocking at the bait may give you a regular buzz-buzz-buzz, just like a big one running steadily away. So you see it isn’t quite as easy as you might have been told, and even when you’ve had a lot of experience and improved your bite indicator in every way you can think of, you’ll often find you’re mistaken in judging the signals, just as you often strike and miss when you use a float. Nobody has yet invented an electric alarm that tells you as much as you can learn by watching your line or float in the daytime. For example, I haven’t yet been able to make an electric indicator that shows when a fish comes towards the rod with the bait, causing the line to fall slack. I don’t suppose you will catch much the first time you night fishing, but you can take care to avoid discomfort by making sure you can sit comfortably, by wrapping up well against the cold – you’ll be surprised how cold it gets at night, even in summer – and by taking plenty of grub and two flasks of hot tea or coffee. Flasks are much better than stoves for hot drinks – if you mess about with lighting stoves, you’re sure to get the only bite of the night when you’re at it, besides the danger of scaring fish with the light, or up-ending the whole lot. Even if you don’t catch much, as long as you are comfortable you won’t regret the outing. I expect you’ll be surprised to find out how much wild life there is about. And of course as it gets light, every bird in the district begins to sing – and you’ll never get tired of hearing that, however many times you go night fishing. And then the sun comes up.” As I have said, Walker was concerned about getting enough material to keep a weekly column going. But his worries were unfounded. The next and subsequent issues in Angling Times saw the letter’s pages full of comment, some positive, some critical and a few derogatory. In addition Walker started getting an increasing personal mailbag. He never did run short of ideas. And certainly Walker could stir it up. If the letter’s pages became a little boring, old Dick could always be relied on to make people want to write in. And write in they did. But Dick did more. He was perhaps unknowingly creating a whole new brotherhood of angling writers. Many well known names of the past and even the present have been inspired by Walker. Walker also made anglers think. As a result, many new concepts and styles of angling came about. Much of the modern angling equipment we have today was designed and manufactured through groundwork laid down by Richard Walker. And now to his last column which appeared on Wednesday, July 13, 1983. By this time, Walker was known as “The Voice of Angling”. “When I began this column, I would have been amazed if I had been told I’d continue to do it every week for 30 years. That’s what has happened – but it is with great regret I have to tell you that this is my last regular contribution. The decision is entirely my own and I think I owe it to you, the readers, to explain the reason for it. To begin with, I have now reached the age of 65 and although I still do a good deal of fishing, I can’t do as much as I think a regular weekly contributor ought to be doing if he is to provide a proper service to his readers. I can’t anymore put in a 12 hour stint on a trout reservoir, or two successive nights on the bank of a carp lake. Your readers deserve someone who can, and there is no shortage of younger men who not only can do it, but who can write intelligently about it. In addition, for some reason I don’t understand, the correspondence that my writing has produced has risen enormously over the past three years, and frankly, it has now gone beyond what I can cope with, if I am to serve faithfully the company for which I work. So, from now on, I must regretfully decline to answer readers’ letters, though of course I hope to stay in touch with those with whom I have already had correspondence. The others won’t suffer because John Crossman’s information service in Angling Times is excellent. I’ve known John for a long time. He doesn’t know everything about fishing, any more than I do, but whenever he doesn’t know the answer, he’ll scurry about until he finds someone who does. As you may guess, I’m feeling very sentimental about ending my regular column, especially because writing it has brought me so many good friends, few of which I would have met otherwise. To me, good friends are the most important part of fishing – I’d rather have a blank day with them, than a big catch in uncongenial company. I’m not going to list all the good friends that writing this column has brought me, because there simply is not enough room – but there is room enough for me to thank them all for the great kindness they have always extended to me. I must also thank a vast number of readers who, over the years, have given me, either intentionally or otherwise, ideas for subjects for this column. I don’t think I could have kept it going without them. Writing a thousand words is easy when your head is buzzing with a good subject, but there is nothing in journalism worse than sitting wondering what to write about. Time after time when I have been in that position, a timely letter from a reader has arrived that has started my pen running happily over the paper. I must also thank the succession of editors and editorial staff with whom I’ve worked over these last 30 years. Without exception, they have left me free to say exactly what I liked, and there has never – no, not once – been the least suspicion of a quarrel or ill feeling with any of them. I suspect this is because they have all been, and still are, keen anglers and very few anglers are anything but nice people. It has always amazed me to see how generous anglers can be when approached personally for a contribution for a good cause – perhaps a fellow club member who has suffered some misfortune – but how, at a meeting from club to NFA or NAC level, any proposal to increase contributions by as little as the cost of a few pints will inevitably be voted down. I need say no more about it – you’ve heard it all before from me, but you will hear it from me again. Perhaps on the day when you find you have nowhere to fish, some of you will remember, and say: “Old Dick Walker warned us enough times didn’t he?” Looking back over 60 years of fishing, 47 years of writing about it, and 30 years of producing weekly columns, not only for Angling Times, but at intervals, years of doing it for national newspapers as well, brings me back a host of memories, nearly all of them pleasant ones. Oddly enough, although I have caught some big fish, their captures do not shine as brightly in reminiscence as you might think. I think more of the happy times spent with good companions and what they have said. Fred Taylor, sitting fishing with icy sleet blowing almost horizontally into his face. “How are you doing Fred?” I asked. “Oh Dick,” he said, “I will be glad when I’ve had enough of this!” Then there were days when I fished with my old friend “BB”. We used to keep our eyes on the time in the evening, and when a certain time arrived, we would begin to recite, in unison, a passage from H.T. Sheringham that we knew by heart. “At a little after half-past eight, this tip trembled and then disappeared. My first thought was a mild wonder as to why it did that…” And so on. Once, when we were reciting it, the float tip did tremble and then disappear. A 4lb tench was responsible. Then there was the day when Pete Thomas foul-hooked a huge carp, at least 40lb, by its rear end. He played it skilfully for some 15 minutes, and then said: “It must be pretty firmly hooked!” Whereupon the hook instantly came away. There was also the day when we pulled a bullock out of Redmire pool – but I could go on and on, and that’s the very thing I’ve decided not to do. So it’s goodbye and good fishing from yours sincerely, Dick Walker.” And so came to an end a glorious era in the history of angling. What Dick did not mention in this last column was that he was dying, and he knew this. He had struggled against cancer for some years at the time of writing this farewell article. He died at his home in Ivel Gardens, Biggleswade on 2nd August 1985. Acknowledgement: |
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