TENCH FISHING IN BIRDLAND

                 

Most anglers appreciate that there’s more to fishing than catching fish and to quote that famous line from ‘A Passion for Angling’ …

          “it’s not about how to catch, it’s about how to enjoy.”

Luckily I’m a mad keen birder, so this year I picked a lake in the Cotswold Water Park that provides a daily symphony of song. Sleeping in my waterside camper van, I’d be literally up with the lark to search for one of the most desirable of wild creatures, a tench … and if I was lucky, I might even catch one. So from the first glimmer of dawn, it was enjoyment all the way.

The water is beautiful, part of a tree lined wetland surrounded by several lakes along with grazing dairy herds. It’s as peaceful a spot as you will ever find in southern England and with the park boasting a bird list of about two hundred species, I was sure there would be plenty to enjoy when the tench weren’t biting.

Upon arrival in the early morning of April 13th, the bird song was deafening, a cuckoo calling incessantly and leading a choir of blackbirds, blackcaps, chaffinches and wrens. 

 

Even more magical was the evocative bubbling of a nearby curlew, the plaintive cry of an increasingly rare bird, though still happily nesting in this wildlife haven.

After all that song I hardly needed to fish because my chosen lake was decorated by many wildfowl and its’ tranquil acres were also large enough to provide the essential mystery that the best fishing requires. The lake is crystal clear, deep in places and very weedy, in fact, a perfect home for tench. 

It also holds large bream, pike and perch, along with a few giant carp which were ancient when I used to fish this lake more than twenty years ago. Their rarity means that I can fish peacefully without the anxiety of my tench tackle being beaten up by a monster.

Being past my sell by date, I find that using the fishing methods I enjoy most are more important than catching fish, so instead of casting out the more efficient bolt rigs, I choose a float, dangled delicately below a pole. So my first priority was to find a swim with deep margins that would give me a chance of catching a tench on a long length of space age carbon. I raked the bottom to clear a narrow channel through the weed and hoped the stirred up bugs would attract a snuffling tinca.

Nothing happened for hours in spite of intense concentration on the tiny tip of my pole float. In fact it was dusk before bubbles appeared in my baited spot and the morsel of worm on my hook proved too tempting for a hungry tench to ignore. It slowly pulled my float under until I struck and those delightful sensations of contact with a wild creature could be enjoyed, even if tempered by the fear that the line might snap. A violent battle of wills followed as the pole elastic stretched close to breaking point and my anxiety increased.

Tench fight hard for survival but they have no need to be afraid, for within moments of being scooped up in the landing net, my prize was released to swim free, back into its’ watery home. Weighing over five pounds, it was a promising start to my mini holiday and with darkness descending, the lowering of head on pillow followed rapidly, though only after a splash of red wine to celebrate success.

Dawn arrived all too quickly, though more than welcome because of the relentless calling of cuckoos close by as I enjoyed a cuppa and bacon sandwich. Walking to my fishing spot past this wonderful sunrise, several great crested grebes hunted for breakfast and when one came up with a large signal crayfish, I gave a silent cheer.

 

American signal crayfish don’t belong here and they have colonised so many waters that they are now a serious threat to our freshwater biodiversity, so no wonder I was pleased that grebes enjoy eating them.


 

 

 

 

 

Several pairs of grebes nest on the two lakes but one close to my swim was having a terrible time with one rapacious crow. Every time she laid an egg on her waterlogged nest, this particular crow was watching and as soon as the female grebe went off to fish, he’d be down to snatch the precious egg. 

 

The crow and his mate terrorised the neighbourhood, wiping out many mallard, moorhen and grebe nests. They were also notorious for stealing anglers bait and on several occasions I had cause to chase them off.

However, when we reported their nest robbing greed to the local game-keeper their days were numbered … and now the pair of grebes have relaid eggs safely and are raising their family unmolested. There are some notable conservationist that think we shouldn’t ‘remove’ any predators but with so many vulnerable species declining alarmingly, I believe we need to find a balance so that every living creature has a chance to recover their numbers, not least the lowly moorhen.

As for our fishy wildlife, the annual invasion of 40,000 cormorants from abroad are a nightmare and are seriously depleting fish stocks in so many freshwaters, to the detriment of other hunters such as grebes, herons, little egrets and even otters. Luckily, all of these still thrive where I’m fishing so that I’m able to enjoy their competition.

On a couple of days a great white egret came fishing for frogs opposite my spot and it’s statuesque size impressed me as it stalked the lake edges. It towered over the ducks below them, though the mallard weren’t as impressed as I and took no notice. It’s exciting that every year, this rare birds numbers are increasing, so even global warming has a plus side!


The next pic is of a duck I didn’t even recognise, though it looks like a cross between a goldeneye and an American bufflehead. I’m guessing it’s a crossbreed from someone’s wildfowl collection but maybe a reader can identify it as I always find it exciting putting names to rare birds.

The lake is a magnet for many species of duck and at risk of making a list, there were numerous mallard and tufted ducks, a few gadwall, a pair of shoveler to go with those regular waterfowl, coots and moorhens along with several exotic looking red-crested pochard.

There were also numerous geese, not just the Canadas with their impressive creches of up to seventeen young but Egyptian geese too which, like the cormorants are all foreigners.

While admiring all this wildlife, I had reverted to the more modern technique of using ledger tackle at range in order to add to my tally of tench, so clipping up my rods and spombing at seven wraps, I fished either a maggot heli rig on one, a worm kebab on another, then an in-line rig on the third. However, I didn’t use all three at once, especially as I had rigged my float rod with a waggler to fish at the bottom of the nearside shelf and this required intense concentration.

All these techniques produced some tench, even when challenged by the cold spring weather and the line was freezing in the rod rings. I thought I must be mad tench fishing in such weather and I guess I was but a little madness is part of the disease that afflicts all of us passionate anglers.

In spite of the cold spring the birding remained as good as ever, the highlights being the birds of prey, for buzzards were building a nest in the willows beyond my swim, a pair of kestrels likewise nearby and frequent sparrow hawks but the fear of god into the blackcaps and long tailed tits, though on one bizarre occasion, I watched a cuckoo chasing the hawk along the side of the lake.

One of the greatest and most unlikely highlights one sunny evening was a pair of goshawks displaying right over my head and given how few big woods there are that are suitable for them to nest in the area, it was hardly believable. However, I had spent two years making a goshawk film around Britain for ITV which sold all over the world, so I was not mistaken. 

My bird of prey book shows how the female's undertail-coverts are fanned out when displaying and the pair I watched were making a good show of it just above me, the best I had ever seen in spite of two years filming them. The male with a rat below clearly shows it's fanned undertail feathers too.

While all this bird action was going on, the cuckoos continued to drive the reed warblers mad with their nest scullduggery and as they flew back and forth across the lake, they serenaded me relentlessly.

Dragonflies were numerous too, beautiful as well and inevitably as the spring moved on, hobbies were attracted and performed their acrobatic manoeuvres as they caught their lunch with outstretched talons. 

 

This marvelous painting was created by Rodger Mcphail for our 'Passion for Angling' book and should have been in colour of course, but for some inexpicable reason, the budget conscious BBC decided that bl/wt would do. Wrong!
 

What a delight all these birds were, especially that even when distracted, I still managed to catch several tench up to a little over seven pounds.

I suppose I should also mention the big bream, for I caught six, four of which were over nine pounds to a best of exactly ten pounds. I won't show that one as I don't want to upset you with it's ugliness, so this nine and a half pounder will have to do.

On many afternoons, the skies were full of swallows and house martins as they hawked for insects on their way to more northern lands and the banks of storm clouds heralded fleets of swifts sweeping the weather fronts for the masses of flying food.

There were red kites passing by too, and given they were so rare when I was a boyhood birder searching for them in the oak woods of central Wales, it’s always a highlight of the year when I see these most graceful flyers. What’s more, their transition from rare to common just proves that not all wildlife bird news is bad!

I was not alone in my enjoyment of the lakes and their wildlife because friends Mark Woodage and John Costello fished nearby and so we were able to share our success’s and bemoan our failures, which were many! When it comes to big fish, I’m a lightweight and preferred to fish what is considered to be the ‘easier’ of the two lakes but Mark and John are proper anglers and fished the larger and weedier lake.

They had to wait a lot longer for a bite and even if their tench were bigger, I like action and argued that size doesn’t matter. I don’t believe that for a minute of course and even after sixty years of fishing, I’m still waiting for my first double figure tench so tried this 'pier' swim on the 'hard lake' for three days and never had a bite! It's a beautiful spot to blank though, isn't it.

Mark caught tench to an impressive 8lb15ozs and John to a little over eight, so after many biteless hours and days, the boys did well. Sharing our catches along with lots of story-telling and leg-pulling is such an important part of the the joy of angling, so their presence made each day memorable.

One more surprise swam up to me one damp evening when ripples suggested an otter was approaching but the binoculars revealed a beaver! I have filmed them in the States but never seen them in Britain and never even knew they existed in the Cotswold Water Park, so I was surprised and delighted, especially when it chewed some willow branches close by, as if to confirm that I was not hallucinating and this was no fish eating otter. It seems that we’ll all be getting used to seeing beavers more frequently in the future, though judging whether this is going to be a good thing or not is a debate for another time.

Drifting off to sleep that night, I could here the distant calls of a bittern and had to pinch myself to ensure that I wasn’t dreaming. However, much of what I had enjoyed there this summer was indeed like a dream come true and goes to prove that there is more to fishing than catching fish.

SAVING WILDLIFE - SNOW LEOPARD

“Some parts of our planet are so brutal that any animal surviving here acquires an almost mythical status.
 

This is the greatest mountain range in the world - the highest, the toughest, the most hostile - the Himalaya. Towering above India’s northern borders, these remote mountains are home to what may be the most glamorous animal on earth.

Just to see one is a dream, to film one nigh impossible - this ghost like creature is the Holy Grail - the ultimate wildlife challenge - the snow leopard”.
 
 

Those above are the opening words of narration for my film on this legendary cat, the first ever attempt at making a film about them. I have always loved cats and having made films about lions, leopards, tigers and mountain lions I had to try an even greater challenge. However, having read lots of scientific research and books, I was in no doubt about just how difficult it was going to be.

Recognised by many as the world’s pre-eminent field biologist, George Schaller described the mountains in which snow leopards live as “a land of just enough” and that refers not just to the animals but the human inhabitants too.

 The tracks of a snow leopard can be seen on the right of this photo and shows just how difficult it was to follow them with camera gear.

Like many mountain adventures, our quest was to end in tears and triumph and for one of us, the dream became a nightmare, his determination driving him close to death, no surprise I guess when trying to conquer this Everest of the natural world.

Ex Australian marine Mitchell Kelly was my main cameraman and in the first couple of years he achieved great success. For instance, snow leopards had never been seen mating, let alone filmed but Mitchell rose to the challenge and succeeded, along with many other firsts. We also managed to film a lot of intimate scenes and got to know how and where they moved around in their precipitous terrain.

However, he had to be evacuated from the mountains three times, once for torn stomach muscles from carrying heavy camera equipment up steep mountain sides, then more seriously, from altitude sickness twice, the last time nearly killing him. It was an immense relief that he survived but from then on the film became a damage limitation exercise.

We had already suffered tragedy when my original colleague and close friend on the quest, Chip Houseman was killed in a Thai Airlines crash just days before we were due to start filming. We had made an Academy Award winning film together on tigers in India and it was during the filming that we hatched a plan to tackle this unconquered challenge.

 

This is not going to be a story of how we made the film, even if we did manage to complete a film about these beautiful cats and learn a lot about how they lived in the unforgiving Himalayas of Ladakh in NW India.

I would lay awake at night, not because I couldn’t sleep in a tent with a broken zip in minus twenty temperatures but because it was the best time to hear the mating calls of the cats. Their high pitched screams would carry a long way through the valleys and give us an idea of where they were located and interestingly, those descriptions by mountaineers thinking they were hearing the yeti calling in the night were actually snow leopards!

I met an English school teacher in Bhutan who described seeing a yeti in a snowstorm on a high pass. It stood by the road edge looking at him, similar to a large grey langur monkey but more like human size, then shuffled off into the trees. When you consider that Bhutan is covered by 60% of dense forest and bamboo and impenetrable, it is easy to hide a large primate from prying human eyes. So yeti’s do exist!
 

That’s a story for another time, so back to snow leopards and our struggles to film them and though our story only scratched the surface, the film was shown on prime time ITV and around the world to big audiences. However, our main achievement was to prove to the wildlife film-making world that snow leopards could indeed be filmed and like my previous story about pumas in the Andes of Patagonia, several film crews followed.

Most notable was cameraman Mateo Willis, the son of a great friend, David Willis who took the wonderful Radio Times pic. I was able to help Mateo a bit on location details etc. and he and his colleagues from the BBC filmed some amazing behaviour for David Attenborough’s series ‘Planet Earth 2’ and if you saw it, you would never forget. The images of three snow leopards and their violent behaviour as a mother defended her cub from an aggressive male were magical.

The result of all this filming success in our chosen valleys in Ladakh is the direct way it has saved snow leopards from persecution, for just as with my pumas, tourists want to see the mythical cats. The local people are as delightful as humans get and were extraordinarily helpful during our filming and they have since become the perfect hosts for tourists seeking snow leopards.

This is our terrific team of Ladakhi helpers who were wonderful companions, some of whome are guiding tourists up there right now. The high ridge above them was a favourite patrol route for snow leopards in the evenings - sometimes!

Attracting tourists was the brain child of the world’s leading snow leopard scientist, Rodney Jackson [who is on the right of our happy snap] and who took this picture of our star cat with his remote cameras. He rightly argued that if the wildlife was worth lots of dollars to the rural economy, they would be looked after by the locals instead of persecuted for killing their sheep and goats. So he encouraged the locals to set up ‘home stays’ for tourists in the tiny mountain villages near the main travel corridors of the cats.

 

One entertaining story from the village which I'm assured is true is of a young girl who took out the family's sheep and goat herd for their daily feed int the hills. It wasn't long before a snow leopard rushed out of the mountain side and grabbed a sheep and the girl, instead of running away, rushed forward and grabbed the other end of her sheep. A tug of war followed and eventually the snow leopard let go and slunk away into the mountains. One sheep saved by a young girls bravery!
 

My friend Mateo Willis who filmed the wonderful snow leopard behaviour for Attenborough’s ‘Planet Earth’ close to this village told me recently that the remote mountains where we filmed in the ’90’s have now become a honey pot for wildlife seeking visitors from abroad and the valleys are full of tents and telescopes. 

 

He also said that the cats have become more tolerant of humans, just as our pumas did in the Andes Mountains and this has now made them easier to see. So it's a win win result all round.

Given the recent skirmishes between the Indian and Chinese armies on the Ladakhi border nearby, this tourist hot spot wouldn’t be a healthy place to be right now, but we are praying that all the snow leopards survive and flourish as they have done these last few years.

 

 

Our films legacy was a small contribution to start the ball rolling in environmental tourism in our chosen patch but you could argue that the peace and tranquility of the area has been spoilt. Maybe George Schaller would think that ‘the land of just enough’ has become ‘a land of too much’, but a lot of wildlife has been flourishing, including the rare and endangered snow leopard and this in turn has allowed many folk to enjoy seeing this mythical creature for the first time.

Given the increasing climate crisis makes me wonder if an increase in wildlife tourism is such a good idea but that’s a debate for another time. However, it’s a likely truth that if wildlife isn’t worth money it’s unlikely to survive and for better or worse, that’s a contribution that television has made a reality.

The wonderful drawings of snow leopards are by that leading artist Gary Hodges, so thank you for sending them to me Gary.