My Heart Always Alights Upon The Nearest Perch …24/06/2013
The title is a Byron quote. There’s todays cultural aspect covered…
After my disturbingly gratifying success of catching sticklebacks on rod and line the other day my attention turned to minnow and bullhead…as it naturally would. Now, I’ve never had either so yet more research was made, friends pressed for info, questions asked and so on…with tip offs in hand I promptly ignored them temporarily and headed for the only place I’d ever seen bullheads via a place I always thought should have them, The Oldest Concrete Bridge In Great Britain. (I thought I should capitalise on that). Built in 1870 it’s hardly Baalbek but then I couldn’t have launched there even If I’d intended to.
Anyway, back to Homersfield and this bit of water. The water itself is the familiar River Waveney, the upper stretch of the Suffolk part of it. Forgive me for skipping the chronology as the thought occurred on the way back that I have now paddled all bar one short section of the eastern end of the river. Bungay loop later in the week then perhaps.
Anyway. There’s free parking here – limited though, maybe 4 cars? A pub the other side of the famous bridge. The launch point is the other side of the bridge too, between the two but is easy – inches of water over a hard bed of sand and stone, mini rapids as it runs pretty quick – especially following rain – a few inches down from a slab of concrete. Drop into the seat and you’re away, straight down into a pool with a fishing platform. There are some decent fish here – we’re talking chub of 3-4lb – and the odd pike. Plenty of dace as well. No minnows for two years though apparently and never seen a bullhead here I’m told. Oh.
Well I saw the big chub but they paid me no mind. Off I set on my hunt...through tight weed and shallow runs, what would be barbel territory in other parts of the country...through crystal clear water, what would be a trout stream elsewhere...through lily pads, reeds, rushes and all manner of plants, with swallows diving and swooping and flitting and flying. This river HAD to be stuffed with fish. I tried the first pool I came to and whipped out a small chub.
Then I spotted some midgets. I stopped, pulled into the bank, changed to a size 20 and a tiny pinkie and lobbed it in, once, twice, three or four times until I had it where and how I wanted by fiddling with the shot and holding the rod just so.
And then, as I watched, one of them took the bait, the whole bait and nothing but the bait (apart from the hook)...perfect!
Super little mini chub, very happy with that! My thrills - being an angler of extremes - come from every fish but increase somewhat when they're either notably larger or notably smaller; mini fish appeal hugely. Kind of a bonsai complex I guess.
Well I carried on down and through tighter and weedier places, the water clarity still impressing me being probably more than ten foot without the polarised sunglasses I need to buy myself. But where were the fish? I was struck hugely by how empty it appeared to be. I mean there is no boat traffic, ideal conditions for shelter, good well oxygenated water and very limited bank access so you'd expect the river to be full of fish but amazingly I'd paddle for ages before catching a fleeting glimpse.
There were other inhabitants too. Aside from the swallows mentioned earlier there were ducks and their young, many different birds, cows on the bank...
...and plenty of swans, just letting me know I must be careful as I passed.
I tried another pool, chub to half a pound and instant bites if I cast into the run between the weeds...
...before finally getting something different (yes, there is something other than chub in this river! with a roach.
The next cast caught the reeds so I ended up pulling myself through the swim and carried on instead. More tight weedy runs, shallows and so on and then some woodwork as I came to some low and overhanging trees which needed getting through. I often wondered if I’d make it to the sluice or whether the river would be blocked at some point but I always got through.
I pulled up in a dark area that varied from six inches to a couple of feet in depth, covered by trees. I recognised it as being the furthest we'd come up-river all those years before, James and I, on his home-built wooden canoe. We'd slept on the riverbank that night and watched shooting stars and stuff, fished from the canoe all the way up with good catches of perch, we'd seen bullheads (the reason I was here), caught pike...this would have been the early nineties and I’d visited this part of the river once since then, again on his canoe I think in 1998. As it happened James was off today but unable to join me.
Well I had plenty of chub and dace here, caught a few trees, lost a few hooks, spilt a few maggots and saw some whoppers – and the first perch - before deciding that time was getting on and I had to scoot...
Now, that bit of bank I mentioned sleeping on. I recognised it. I'd had a whopping great high-double pike hit a lure three times in succession back in the day without being hooked and we'd both had some smaller fish there. Well, as soon as I got there I saw that the water was deep and quite clear, the vegetation was lower than the surface and having transported my lure rod all this way I may as well give it a whirl the first time it was possible.
210cm 10-30g Xtraflexx, Maxximus LP Magnet 6bb, 20lb braid and trace wire and finally a 12cm Eco Snake multi-jointed lure in Firetiger. 100% Fladen right-through. I’d not used this lure in anger yet, had tried trolling one when I first unwrapped it and they don’t take to that so it’d sat with the rest of its ilk (I have the full colour range) until a day like this where casting would be the only option. It was a pity she didn’t troll though because the action was a sight to behold – like an eel slipping through the water if the speed is got just so.
Well. Catcher of men or catcher of fish? I clipped on. Remember, this was the first cast of the day with the lure rod, the very first cast of this lure, and it resulted in my first freshwater PB of the season (the new-to-me stickleback not included) and was somewhere in the region of 2-3lb (the only scales are on the fish). A specimen fish then! Initially I thought I had a jack until I saw the flash of red from the fins...double, triple the size or more of my previous largest perch. I was gobsmacked and could watch it running and turning and showing its flanks thanks to the water clarity. Such a joy to have it so clear! Powerful lunges but not quite the speedy fight of a summer pike sadly. That is NOT an ungrateful complaint mind you! Well I got it alongside and was stunned. The flanks had a marvellous golden sheen that I’ve not seen before and it looked like a carp or bream being so chunky. I lifted it carefully from the water and the dorsals snapped straight up. WOW! This was an incredible fish! I perhaps overdid it on the photos but with our most stunning coarse fish, great colouring, beautiful lighting and such a large example I couldn’t not really!
Well, now for unhooking. The rear treble was inside the mouth just forward of the gills. I’m used to trolling wherein the hooks are almost always in the scissors on a pike, only once have I had one taken inside the mouth. I remembered that I’d seen my pliers in the boot, drying out… this put me in a slight quandary, I couldn’t pull the hook out, what else did I have? My small disgorger was, well, small so that didn’t work…Ah yes, of course. I DO have a v-shaped disgorger, I HAVE A SWISS ARMY KNIFE!!!!! Well, I’ve never used this attachment before, unlike the hoof-pick, but it was spot on. Straight onto the shank, a push and it was off. Sweet! One last unadorned photograph and I slid it back; it was away, strongly.
I shouldn’t have had another cast, I couldn’t match or beat a fish like this! I suspected a pike though and spoilt the prefect moment. Oh well.
I wondered what Isaak Walton would have made of this (apart from a fine meal of course). I had a look later:
The Pearch is a very good, and a very bold biting fish. He is one of the Fishes of prey, that like the Pike and Trout, carries his teeth in his mouth which is very large, and he dare venture to kill and devour several other kinds of fish, he has a hook’t or hog back, which is armed with sharp and stiff bristles, and all his skin armed or covered over with thick, dry, hard scales, and hath (which few other Fish have) two fins on his back. He is so bold, that he will invade one of his own kind, which the Pike will not do willingly, and you may therefore easily believe him to be a bold biter.
Quarter of an hour later I was at the sluice. Now for what I came for!
I got out for a recce before portaging. Chatted to a fella who’d had plenty of large chub this week – nope, no minnows or bullheads here. Chub and gudgeon. Oh.
…and a pike, attacking his catches. I offered to shoo him away, flicked out the lure and the first time it turned for it. I’d need to twitch it differently – it was in a foot of water and I was going on the other fellas directions. I spooked it and it went deeper and closer to the bank. Under the trees.
And that, dear reader, is where my magnificent, wonderful, lucky Firetiger Eco Snake now resides.
I failed to get anything in the pools here and bidding my fellow angler farewell I set off back, paddling hard non-stop for an hour and a quarter against wind and flow, somewhere in the region of four to five miles, before I reached the bridge again, caught a final fish and disembarked for the twenty mile run home. I must have seen 8-10 kingfishers during my day, the closest being within fifteen feet and i'd also brained myself on a branch, padlding at full tilt and nearly hitting my temple and it nearly had me in luckily I got away with it. I’d certainly put some miles in today but…target missed.
Not that I’m complaining mind…
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