I cannot claim any great success in pursuit of trout; they remain something of an enigma species to me, although I will confess to a curiosity. My first trout weighed about 4ozs and was poached from the River Chess, during a school holiday. It was stalked in the crystal clear waters with great skill, bearing in mind the worry that the bailiff would be along at any moment. The fact that this was a very private (dry fly) chalk stream and I was using worms as bait only heightened the excitement. My school friend, Andy, and I also had the River Misbourne to poach in, and a millpond at Little Missenden, was emptied of trout up to two pounds over the course of a week. This was done an hour before dark, with us taking turns to fish/keep lookout. Again, worms were used, and as there only a small patch of clear water in the weed-choked pond, the trout couldn’t get very far. In all we had over a dozen fish in that week, and never went back. Some of the local lads got wind and tried the next week, they didn’t catch any trout, but did get caught trespassing by the police!
After those deliberate captures, my next two trout were both complete flukes. First a Thames four-pounder, which took a pike live bait, followed a fortnight later by a Thames two pounder, which took double maggot. Both were returned alive, which I saw as atonement for the Misbourne fish, which had been given away to just about everyone we knew. I did spend a couple of seasons fishing various sections of the Thames, during the coarse close season. Didn’t manage to catch any trout, but got on first name terms with those ever-vigilant boys from the Thames Conservancy. I am sure that the lock keepers used to tip them off that someone was fishing on their patch, and a tackle and methods investigation was launched. As I always used artificials, no crime could be detected, but their parting shot was always ”Watch yourself, lad”. Difficult to do when you are fishing alone, I always found, and didn’t really help with them usually mooring their launch right at my feet.
Some years later, I took the first proper steps on the fly fishing road, as something to do in the close season. My downfall was, and still is, casting. I can hurl a mackerel tail 100 yards, but cannot get that fly line out at all! I know it’s all in the timing, but no matter how I try, all I get is a heap of line about 30 feet from the bank. That 30 ft does not of course include 6 ft of cast; reduced down from 12 ft because of wind knots my Scoutmaster would have cried himself to sleep over. My companion at the time, Bob, could of course, shoot a full fly line out to the backing, roll cast, steeple cast etc, etc. He could also tie imitation flies at the bank side, after spooning fish. (I am still puzzled by this. All the articles I read suggest spooning fish to ascertain their current diet, but if you can’t catch one of the little buggers in the first place, how are you ever going to know!!)
I have thrashed the water to foam at all the usual places, Pitsford, Grafham, Vicarage Spinney, Tringford, Farmoor, but I never caught a ‘limit’ bag anywhere. Here I seem to differ from many trout fishermen who seem obsessed with limits to the extent that they feel ‘cheated’ if they don’t catch one.
At this point I must mention a delightful chap I met at Farmoor. He was fishing next to me for some time, but appeared to be in pain judging by the noises he was making, both during the cast and on the retrieve. After a particularly extended bout of moaning, I did enquire after his well-being, but he didn’t acknowledge my concern, so I thought ‘Sod it!’ When I moved swims, I walked past him and all became clear. He was wearing a Walkman – volume button round to number eleven, and humming along to ‘Meatloaf – Bat out of Hell’, but only grunting every forth or fifth note. He looked up and smiled as I walked past, and I smiled back, wondering if he would ever learn all the words to the song before he went deaf! Anyway, back to the story.
If anglers are that desperate for trout, why don’t they just go to the local fishmongers and buy £ 25 worth? (And they would be gutted and cleaned!) I don’t expect to catch a pike/carp/tench/roach every time I go pike/carp/tench/roach fishing; I go to actually be fishing. I know trout fisheries stocking densities are far higher, (as is the cost of a day ticket!) but to me this seems like my fishing week on the Misbourne. I just put the bait in, and fish came out until there weren’t any more. I spent some time fly-fishing for trout in and around Fort William in Scotland. The fishing there was by and large free. On one remote loch I had to ask the farmer’s permission, and was told the cost was £ 1.00 for the day or £ 2.00 if I wanted breakfast or lunch! I had very little success with the trout, but could not have had better surroundings to be fishing in; just being part of that scenery was reward enough. Returning to the commercial fisheries, the best fish I have caught was a brown trout of just over four pounds from Grafham. This, however, was caught on a plug whilst pike fishing, and was released after a twenty minute scrap that had me thinking I was latched on to a twenty five pound pike!
A summer holiday near Camelford showed me some of the perils of trout fishery management. The brochure made note of a stream, and small lake, which could be fished on a catch and release or £ per lb basis. I had thrown a few bits of tackle into the car, and one evening I told the wife not to get anything in for tea, as I would go and catch us a trout! (Sounds stupid now, but we all act the hunter/gatherer sometimes – don’t we? No, well, just me then!) Anyway, off I strolled. The stream was just that, about seven feet at its widest, and 9 inches deep. Walked up and down the bank, but didn’t see any thing that looked remotely fishy. Crossed over a wooden bridge to the round pond, and felt happier straight away. By the colour of the water I could tell it was deep, and had a couple of small islands in the middle. Being only thirty yards across, even my pathetic casting meant I was able to cover the entire water – perfect. Out went the fly line, back it came, out went the fly line, back it came, change the fly, out went the line, back it came, listen to stomach rumble, out went the fly line etc. etc…Owner of the holiday village leans over the fence and asks how I am getting on. I tell him that sport is slow, but its nice just to sneak in an hour’s fishing before it gets dark (I don’t mention the fact that I have actually been all round the pond three times, and tried every one of the six flies I bought at every depth, and the bloody supermarket shut half an hour ago, and if I have to go out and buy fish and chips my life will be made a misery) – when I get a take! A short, sharp struggle, as the trout hadn’t really got too far to go in that pond, and a two and a half pound rainbow was on the bank, and I was saved, fire up the grill!
The owner must have had a good day, because he said ”I reckon that’s the last one. Let’s call it a pound and you can settle up tomorrow”. On the way back down the river he explained that the pond was operated on a put and take basis, and usually stocked with fish up to the pound mark. Nothing bigger because kids would quite often fish there, and even trout that size will go some. He bought the trout in 50lb batches i.e. 50/60 fish at a time, until the last batch. Due to a mix up at the trout farm, he only got about 15 fish in the last load, but he did get 50 lbs! Some of them were over four, and he thinks there was a six amongst them, judging by the size of the trout steaks he saw on a barbeque one night. He had complaints from holidaymakers of kids hooking fish and nearly being pulled in, broken and lost tackle, but as he relied on people’s honesty, none of the fish reported to him during the week weighed over a pound!
I understand the years of ingrained snobbery over game and coarse fishing, but would introducing a few trout into coarse fisheries be such a bad thing? Surely the possibility of catching a trout at most carp puddles can only increase the excitement. (Hell, aren’t most of the carp boys using trout pellets as bait anyway?) A few slipped in the Gt. Ouse near me (upstream of Bedford!) might give the barbel a rest, and they may even eat some of the crayfish. Surely anyone spinning for pike or perch wouldn’t mind terribly if a five-pound rainbow took a fancy to their plug/spinner.
I am not suggesting illegal stocking, just a few controlled ‘bonus’ fish to liven things up. As I understand it, rainbow trout are not indigenous to the UK and therefore cannot breed, so there can be no population explosion. One of the best day’s fishing I ever had was on a private pond, which had been stocked with just about everything. You never knew what was going to pop up next, golden tench, bream, carp, trout, perch, rudd, koi, etc, etc.
And yet we all seem happy to be heading towards ‘single species’ waters – is it because we prefer to know what’s coming out? Uniformity and predictability in fishing – is that really what it’s all about?
