This is my nephew Mike:
You can’t see his face but that’s just bad timing on my part. Anyway, Mike hasn’t been out with me for ages, the last time being a whiting bash about a year ago. He’s been working hard for his exams and having finished them has been working hard as a maintenance gardener; it was about time he had a break. As he’s hoping to do a skydive for Heroes on the Water, a new charity offering kayak fishing to assist the rehabilitation of wounded servicemen, when he raises enough money (£130 to go!) and the kayak angling community has already dipped their hands in their pockets towards it I figured it’d be good to get him out there doing some kayak fishing himself.
Originally I’d planned to take him out to sea for smoothound but the wind built all morning and it became inadvisable so I reverted to the backup plan of trolling for pike on the Waveney. Now Mike isn’t an experienced angler though he does do a bit but he’d never had a pike before and the hope was that today would be the day. Picking him up at noon we headed for the river.
I still needed a pike for the competition, having lost two the other day, but the main focus was on getting him some and so the luckiest lure of the month was put on his rod, a 7cm Eco Narrow in a tiger pattern. This is a sub-surface lure that wobbles like crazy, rattles like mad and creates an insane amount of bubbles from the grooves and holes moulded in; it has been taking perch regularly when I’ve tried it but would it take a pike? With this clear water and all the weed it seemed the best option of the lot.
We parked by the swimming pool and headed upstream. Weed was an issue both deep and on the surface and I resorted to 13cm Jointed Minnows in bright colours. I missed one by the boat houses, feeling a pull but having it spring off but Mike was just getting weeded; we persisted with that lure though.
I overtook him while he was de-weeding and passing Barsham, where I had another take that I dropped, I found a likely spot to try my hand casting an Eco Snake, to no avail. Mike turned up five minutes later and then called out as he drew level and slowed that he thought he was tangled…but the rod was bucking…
No surprise! He did as he was told, played the fish well then brought it up to the side where I showed him how to hold and unhook the fish. The look of joy on his face was splendid and he declared it massive! Easily the biggest he’s seen and his first pike to boot.
Well, I had to call up his dad for Mike to let him know. We chatted for a few minutes as I told the tale of my first pike and then moved off again, me in the lead. Mike came away from the bank, cast, made a few paddle strokes then called out “Uncle Mark” again and I turned…
Spawney Git!
A bit smaller but two ahead of me now! Unhooked it swam away strongly and we continued upriver for a while until it shallowed and trolling became impossible. We turned and headed back.
I heard a yell and saw a good splash behind him but then the fish was off. Damn, that was a better fish!
We set off once more and got all the way down to the bypass bridge with the only excitement being a good fish that threw the hooks on the surface as it splashed; my third loss of the day. We turned and started to head back upstream to the launch point, time having run out for another trip up to Barsham; fifty yards and…
This was starting to get familiar…is he magnetic or what? He kept offering me the use of that lure but I resisted…until, after a spot of casting near a known pike lay, I gave in with time running out and took it, giving him the rod with a firetiger 13cm Jointed Minnow on it. Off I went without a sniff for the last five hundred yards.
Now I could claim from this photo that it was mine but alas not; see? A Jointed Minnow in Firetiger. He was starting to take the Mickey now! We landed shortly after, me thoroughly beaten and he thoroughly chuffed! Loaded up and it was time, in 26 degrees, to grab a chocolate thickshake from McDonalds on the way home.
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