Is there some truth in the saying…all I know about rain, for a simple fisher like me who does not sit rigidly under a brolly, but spend much of my fishing time roving the riverbank..is that I get wet. Though my Goretex is pretty protective, as is my wide brimmed hat.
That reminds me of when I was at the club lake and three -rods Jace was laughing at my swanky leather hat…I wear it because the brim shelters my eyes from bright sun and provides a good shade over my sunglasses, while the brim protects the back of my neck from rain, and the top of my head and neck from falling creepy crawlies when I am sitting against the old willow on a summer’s eve willing my red goose quill in the margins to slide away, courtesy of a plump tinca tinca..
But, on this particular day I had to smile at big carper Jace’s base ball cap during the ensuing down pour. No matter how he turned it, he could not prevent the rain streaming down his face, or giving him that uncomfortable feeling down the back of his neck, depending on which way he decided to wear the peak.
Anyway, I digress, you haven’t tuned in to listen to the strengths or weaknesses of my wide-brimmed hat…
So there I was happily minding my own business on my beloved stream when the heavens burst open. I’d only dropped in for an hour’s casting about on the way home from work. I’d never seen rain like it, stair rods, you could see the stream rising.. one of those fifteen minute periods when you think God surely can’t send any more water down…but it’s a precious resource and, deep down, I could feel the gratitude for an outburst which was already topping up low summer levels and over-extraction by Three Valleys water Company to meet the demands of yet another new housing development in the Colne Valley.
And at the very height of the storm, I dropped a bait over the marginal growth and bang, the rod wrapped round before I could even lay the beautiful cane on the rushes,; before the bait hit bottom.. I knew it was unlikely to be a barbel though I have caught beards instantly in a pre-baited swim and Barbel Dave my fishing partner has often seen barbel come up in the water on the Upper Ouse to intercept a bait. But this ‘take’ was chub-like, the fish fought hard and long, sustained perhaps by the sudden influx of oxygen to its lair.. shaking its head to free itself of the burden.
I had not thought to rest a while and shelter under the huge oak behind me. I just fished on. While all around me became sodden. The rain came as a bolt out of the blue, literally.
And there on the bank was the first chub taken on my new green whipped, trumpet-handled wonderful cane Barder Barbus Maximus II – so, ok, it wasn’t a barbel, but it was a chubby chevvy. A real chubby chevvy. At five pounds and eight glorious ounces it was my first five from the tiny stream. I had had plenty of fours to four and a half pounds. But this was a huge fish, (the photo really does not do it justice) the biggest I had seen banked from the stream. I’d heard of the occasional five at the back end of the season, but not one eight ounces above five and only eight ounces below six.
Let’s put it in perspective.. with summer marginal growth this section of stream was about eight feet wide, the swim depth between 18 inches and two feet. But there was gravel, sreamer weed and a snaggy willow, mostly in the stream. The very reason the fish were there. The TV property programmes shout Location, Location, Location. Fishing is no dfferent.
Ten minutes later, still raining heavily, but nothing like the preceding storm, I took a four-plus pounder from the very next swim downstream. Small streaming at it best. Its very best.
And that was it. I was soaked. I was elated, and I’d banked a wonderful summer brace.
Was I just lucky, had my watercraft and knowledge of the stream taken me to just the right downstream swim at just the right time on just the right day. Or had the storm played its part? Boy, do I ask too many questions, even of myself, but my close angling friends know that anyway. I am after all still the kid journalist at heart, chasing fire engines and ferreting stories as I did in my early years. That said, asking questions within my business life is what still puts food on the table and pays the mortgage.
And my questioning – in a polite and friendly manner, of course, of locals all round the country has often put me in The swim – that’s the with a capital T.
But perhaps I had just been lucky – or maybe the summer storm had brought with it plummeting barometric pressure, it was warm, it was mild,. Ideal conditions. The rain had knocked the earlier sun out, so there was less light penetration of the water. The storm had churned up the surface water as if it were a Kenwood mixer. Just maybe, as a result, the chub lost their caution. Perhaps the ferocity of the storm immediately started washing grubs, worms and slugs into the stream, alerting old ‘loggerhead’.
Did it matter? Did I need to ask questions of myself? Of the stream,? Of the weather conditions, or of the chub?
It mattered not, for I was homeward bound. A happy hunter.
Gary Cullum
