The Tiny River Alne – Spotties and Sockdolagers

Now the tangleator Sam is fast becoming a great little angler, he's not usually a good listener but ones interest in fishing is certainly knocking off on him, which is very encouraging. He can recognise and identify nearly all the fish species we catch, even the tiny fish which at that size, even I need a second glance.

The sight of a kingfisher, the hovering of a bird of prey, the owl on patrol, all part and parcel of the pastime he shares with me, not the novelty it used to be. Sessions were initially frustrating when I started to take him from when he 4 years old, 3 years on, apart from the unhooking I generally have to do,he can almost fish independently now.

He also can identify likely holding spots for fish but also what species could be in those swims, not only that but he appears to prefer the small diminutive rivers and streams I do. So for this short morning session we were going to visit the "bullhead" swim down the "Alne Brook" not the "Brook Brook". Sam caught the biggest bullhead I'd ever seen in the winter and it's always been on our radar ever since.

Simple tactics I had my tiny sensitive wand rod and Sam had his float rod. Double red maggot on size 18 hook.

Now recent floods the Alne back to being shallow again was looking a little out of sorts, the fish not in their usual spots so it took a while to catch the first one. A chublet that came to Sam fishing close to the bank on red maggot, then he caught a trout and perch from the same swim, "wow, we just need a Gonk now" not quite, but a chunky Gudgeon was caught soon after.

We had to move around but sadly no bullheads were caught, we managed 4 trout in the end, 4 or 5 chublets, perch, dace as well as 2 more small gudgeon it was a cracking little session. Sam couldn't wait to tell his mum and brother what he had caught when he got back, especially as he had caught more fish than me.