Wintle's World of Angling # 100

Wintle's World of Angling #100 - Dream Fish DOESN'T THREE YEARS pass quickly? When Graham asked me to consider a regular column I didn't think that it would keep going this long! Mark - he's caught plenty of roach over 2lb This article celebrates 100 articles for Wintle's World of Angling, not including the many articles outside of it that I've written including the Commercials series. Ron Clay's recent jubilations and tribulations over what he initially thought was a dream fish of a Yorkshire 2lb roach that turned out to be an ide got me thinking about what my dream fish are, and the lengths that I'll go to try and catch them. Like many on this site I have a hectic life fitting in a full time job, as much fishing as I can manage without neglecting my wife, getting the DIY done (will this year's bathroom project ever get finished?), as much angling writing as I feel inspired to do, as well as the day to day domestic chores and social life. Fishing for me can be as serious as the mood takes me; sometimes a quest for a very special fish, often just some contemplative floatfishing as an antidote to the pressures of modern life. This summer the second has been far truer than the first, unlike last year when the opposite was true. 2.14 Ouse Perch But over the years certain targets have always beckoned, a 2lb roach, 5lb chub, 10oz dace, etc. When it comes to personal bests fate has decreed that each of my PB's must be won ounce by ounce, once I've got to a reasonable specimen as a personal best. Yet once I finally do smash a PB the 'fill-in' fish seem to follow quickly behind! Even when people have promised to take me to waters 'where I can't fail' to up my personal best it seems that the gremlins spoil the party. The best example of this was when angling artist John Searl took me floater fishing on a syndicate lake (barely ¼ acre) where I would smash my personal best carp of just 12-6 with ease. So how come I caught the two smallest carp in the lake and still failed by a couple of ounces to beat my best? Later that summer I did add 3lbs to get a personal best of 15-6 yet there are loads of kids out there caching 20lbers and above. I have filled in the low teens with a succession of 13-14 lb fish this year but big carp remain a bogey fish for me, despite catching thousands of them. But I'm sure that one day I'll crack 20lbs and then as ever the fill-in fish will follow. For chub and roach it's a much happier tale. I was lucky enough to be in the thick of the Dorset Frome roach boom back in the early eighties. Earlier still in the seventies my ambition was to catch a two-pounder. At that time only one or two were caught per season from my local waters so the first one was a long time coming. I had lots up to a pound and a half, and then finally got my first two-pounder in early March 1977. Typically I had a second and slightly bigger one within a week. Three or four years later that personal best of 2-4 increased in leaps and bounds to 2-8 and settled at 3-0, a fish that I've equalled but never beaten. Of the 'fill-in' fish it's only 2-12 and 2-15 that I've not had of all the weights to three pounds so no real complaints at all. I retain an affection for big roach but their comparative scarcity, and a lack of remaining ambition, mean that my days of chasing them are over. A chub over 6lb for Mark Until last summer it was my ambition to catch a six pound chub. That happened quicker than I believed possible, and once I broken my duck I increased my personal best by another ounce. A seven pounder is but a pipe-dream; if one turns up I'll be equipped to land it but I can't see myself flogging Throop again to the degree that I did last summer. Barbel are another fish that for me follow the perfect pattern of me having a personal best that seems impossible to beat. My first notable personal best was 8-2 back in the seventies. This went up to 9-0 within a few years and then inched up by painful ounces to 9-8 having been 9-2 and 9-5 in the meantime. What happened this summer is a tale for another day that you'll have to wait for! The Dorset Frome of my youth held plenty of good sized dace as well as big roach. I took the trouble to get the best ones that I caught at our official weigher's-in on greengrocers scales. There was a sticking point around 11 ounces which leads me to be suspicious of those that blithely claim pounders here, there and everywhere. My best officially weighed was 0-12-4, and I had several of 0-11-0 to 0-11-8. “So what?” You ask, but I won the dace cup in Wareham a number of times and also Wimborne DAC and Ringwood DAA dace cups. I haven't weighed a dace in for many years but do try to weigh accurately the best ones I get. If I take 0-11-8 as a benchmark, equivalent to a 2lb roach, then I've had five two-pound roach for every dace of that size. And that's despite catching far more dace than roach. My best remains at 14oz, and a pounder an ambition to cherish. I won't take you through every species that I've caught but a short list of ambitions remains; 20lb pike, 7lb tench, 5lb mullet, 3lb crucian (I can get the brown goldfish over that weight!) and 20lb carp. But in a way I'm glad that my personal bests have been so hard won. My ambitions remain after several decades so I'm far from burnt out. I believe that if I'd caught them all soon after starting I'd have packed in long ago. When I see that some younger, son of a famous specimen hunter, has had his first six-pound chub at the age of seven or whatever then I despair - what is left? In fishing I have discovered far more than just catching big fish. Match fishing success, and more lately the fun of writing about it have been equally rewarding. But in a way the success of this column and other articles has for me been as good as catching a dream fish. Quite where I am in my writing career remains to be seen but I have no problem at all finding subjects to write about, and more serious writing projects beckon, much aided by Graham. Watch this space! Next time - 'A Twist of Fate'