POSTSCRIPT TO FISHING MEMORIES

I suppose all good things must come to an end. Unfortunately for me, after over 60 years of fishing, my lifelong adventure with angling has indeed come to an end. Today, August 15^th 2013, I have made the ultimate decision to hang up my fishing tackle. I know that many, many, anglers, continue to enjoy their fishing well into their seventies and beyond. At the age of 68, unfortunately, due to ill health, I will not be one of them. I am afraid I do not have the body strength or will to carry on the pastime which I have loved. My decision has been made despite joining my local fishing club, Newton Abbot Angling Association, only a week ago.

There is a story attached with my demise. Thinking on it, the start of the demise came about a year and a half ago. I had a stroke about that time and although no major damage was done to my main organs, it weakened my body’s ability to stave off other conditions. Very soon after the stroke, I developed the shingles virus which attacked the nerves in my head. Normally you get the blisters with it which are very painful. The condition which I had diagnosed was that the nerves in my scalp were attacked, but no blisters. It was and is still quite painful, especially when I am under stress or I have concentrated for a long time.

Over the last year I have also suffered with a muscle wasting disease called fibro-myalgia in my neck, shoulders and both arms. The left arm has been affected the most and at times I have great difficulty lifting anything except the smallest of weights. Over the last six months I thought it was improving but it is back again with vengeance, especially in the mornings when the muscles are cold. Because of this I have had to keep my fishing trips to a minimum of only twice in this time. Because of the weakness, I have found it gradually harder and harder to carry fishing tackle and hold a fishing rod for any length of time. I find it hard to get to sleep at night and have to take pain killers to do so. I find myself feeling more and more tired during the day.

I did not want to admit to myself that I was not capable of continuing to go fishing so I decided to find out what I was capable of doing. Earlier in the spring, I decided to go on a fishing weekend with my brother Wilf.  We went to a well known carp lake which advertised 30lb+ fish to be caught. I had never caught a carp of that size before, so with my brother at hand, I thought to give it a go. Just our luck, it seemed that the carp chose that week to spawn and we blanked. Being under canvas for 2 days and nights took its toll on my body and although I had my tackle taken to my swim and even had my bivvy put up for me, I suffered badly.

 I had a job to drive home and it took me a whole week to get over the experience. I suppose I felt pretty low as we also blanked. The whole session was a gross waste of money and did me no good at all. I did know by then, however, that I could not go night fishing, or do long stints on the bank side any more.

That was over two months ago and having rested up I thought maybe I might be able to do short stints for silver fish. I decided last week to join my local angling club at one of their come fishing open days. The club had a number of “Fishing Buddies”, who had their tackle set up and you could spend the hour fishing with them. It was mainly for young kids and an introductory to fishing for them, but they were happy to let me try.

 I quickly found out that I had a real problem with landing the fish as I had no strength in my left arm to lift the landing net with a fish in it. The anglers around me came up with several ideas as to how I could get over the problem. The best one was to set up the landing net in the landing position at the start with the tip of the net just under the surface. The idea was for me to play the fish over to the net and to just lift the net up just enough to stop the fish swimming out, but not taking the full weight of the net plus the fish.

The problem we had with the method was that the landing net would continually slide down into the water. What it needed was an attachment like a hook on the butt section which could be hung onto a bank stick with a rod rest attached to the top of it.

I thought that I would see just what I was capable of and arranged a day’s fishing at the lake, on my own, for the following Wednesday. That was yesterday. I took plenty of time loading my gear into the car the day before and intended to go early morning for my session.

I arrived at the lake just before 6am. From the car to my swim was a journey of some 60 yards. It took two return journeys to get my gear there. Even though I had left all my bulky carp equipment at home and only planned to do silver fish angling it was a bit of an effort to lift it all. It left my shoulders and arms aching and it took a lot out of me. When I finally sat down after erecting my angling chair and adjusting the legs, I had to rest for nearly half an hour before I could think about tackling up.

 I managed to tape the metal hook onto the butt section of my landing pole and I set about manipulating the net into position so the tip of the net was just below the surface and within the reach of my left arm. The hook linked onto the bank stick, stopped any sliding into the water. It was about 8am before I made my first cast.  The whole landing net set up worked a treat as I played a 6lb+ bream over the net and by just holding the net above the surface, I was able to drop my rod onto its rod rest and use both hands to slide the landing net up to my unhooking mat.

A further bream of around 3 and a half pound followed after about another hour. During the session I did lose a large fish which tore off to my left in a bid for freedom. I managed to stop it, but after tearing off to my right and under an overhanging tree, it escaped. Two other tench didn’t though and found their way into my landing net. I did manage to also catch about a dozen roach and rudd up to about the 8oz mark to complete my session haul. After about 6 hours fishing my whole body was aching and I had a bad headache. My arms hurt and felt like they were dropping off.

I packed up my gear and started the first trip to the car. By the time I reached the boot I was really aching badly and sweating. I found it really difficult to carry the fishing box and chair on the 2^nd journey and when I finally got to the car I could hardly walk and I had sweat running off my head, down my neck. After loading my tackle into the car, it was all I could do to plop myself down into the driver’s seat position.

On the way back I had to turn the cold blower on quite high to cool me down, but still having to continually wipe my face and neck to soak up the sweat. I arrived home and I was dreading having to carry up all my tackle to our flat on the first floor. Even though my wife, Glenys, helped me with the carrying, I was a real mess by the time we had finished. I remember thinking that I would have to do this every time I went fishing and was it really worth it, especially if I got worse.

I think that my body wouldn't be able to cope with more of that sort of punishment. Today I sat on my settee and made the decision to stop fishing. I am feeling really old at present and I thought this day would never come. I would be one of those anglers who would probably die on the river bank. I don’t know what I can do to replace the gaping hole that not fishing will make.

Well here we are and I suppose that I will still have my fishing memories to look back on.    

So to that last cast into the Sun before it all ends.  Thanks for the memories mate, irreplaceable life experiences for me, it's been an honour Ed or Gary.