Warwickshire Avon - The Untrodden Pt.18

I'm all for making life easy for the angler. (God knows, I need all the help I can get.) But I would respectfully suggest that the electronic lure invented by a biologist at the Severn-Trent Water Authority has gone a bit too far in that it's far too good.

First of all, the lure hypnotises fish with electronic pulses in tune with their brain waves, such as they are. When they get close enough, its power locks their muscles rigid, leaving them paralysed in the water for the angler to net at leisure. 

Not only that, the lure can be tuned to different wavelengths to attract different kinds of fish: eels home in on three pulses a second, pike on ten and carp on twenty. 

The biologist, Dr Richard Spray, pulled in 169 pike in 22 hours from a two-mile stretch of water during one of his experiments. And then went on to work out the wavelengths for other fish, including trout.

Dr Spray sees the main application of the lure in fishery management. But if lures tuned to salmon and trout ever get on the market, there'll be a lot of non-management persons wandering the bank in the dead of night with a warmed-up and unlighted Land Rover parked under the trees.

Is not the lure the answer to every angler's prayer? Dr Spray thinks not. 'It'll take the fun out of fishing,' he says, 'so I don't believe the ordinary angler will want to use it.'

Such faith in human nature is touching, but can you see the average cack-handed tiddler snatcher passing up the chance to sit in the pub and boast: 'Yerss... Not a bad morning. Shifted 169 pike first thing, then beamed into about 450 bream and finished up with 50-odd carp from the pool. Not a patch on last week, mind you...'"

Anybody getting down to the water behind that lad I would be on a hiding to nothing. Talk about first up, best dressed. Even if the first angler returned the fish in double- quick time, to have the 'fluence put on them by the next comer, it's doubtful if the fish themselves would think much of the performance:

'I'm getting a bit fed up with this, Simon. Five times I've been beamed up this morning. Not had a chance to eat a thing.'

'Me too, Mick. Ooh, me 'ead..."

Perhaps Dr Spray would consider re-directing his research into the brain waves of anglers. Not only could local publicans beam out the message that their establishments were open for quenching the thirsts of the gentry, but they could use the pulses to guide anglers unfamiliar with the area to their very doors.

Or perhaps not. Surveys have shown that the average angler knows immediately when it's opening time, whether he's carrying a watch or not. Something to do with his biological rhythms. And he seldom has trouble locating the nearest boozer: he just follows the pulsing in his nose.

There's also the danger that such a sophisticated system of mind control could be misappropriated by the anglers' Nearest and Dearest to call them back from the bank and home for their tea. What a horrifying prospect: hundreds of zombified anglers packing up and lurching slowly along the bank, arms stretched out in front of them. Walking straight past the pub and chanting: 'I come, my love. I hear... I obey...'

No, it wouldn't do at all. In fact there's a deal of danger in any interruption of the angler's mental functions when he's near the water, as Doc Thumper will confirm.

Doc lives on the Thames, lucky lad, and can fish from the bottom of his garden. When he's on standby, just in case he's wandered along the bank, he carries a bleeper which allows Misses Doc to warn him of any emergency calls.

This worked fine, until one day Doc was having trouble with a chub which had made for a half-sunken tree. He was balanced precariously on the sticky-out end of the trunk, trying to turn the chub's head, when the bleeper went off in his pocket and imparted a severe shock to the system. What followed was not a comfortable experience, but it did lead Doc to one important discovery, that, unlike Dr Spray's lure, the common-or-garden bleeper does not work six feet under water !! 😛

Be careful out there chaps, the banks are muddy, the river cold, don't go falling in there if you can help it. !!!

Anyway I was back out again on the syndicate stretch this time with a pint and a half of bronze maggots to see if I was missing a track, oh and to see if I could catch something other than chub. The rain was easing up and that lovely tinge of green was gradually turning in to weak tea as the session played out. The bites were at a premium too with some small roach caught and then after a couple of hours with my hands now pretty cold, I managed a couple of chub must have ventured out from their hidey-hole, and succumbed to the maggots.

They came on subsequent casts dragging bottom however no more showed and after another 40 odd minutes trotting with even the roach now suspicious in their absence, it was time for the off. A very cold morning indeed, the river however was a tad warmer than I thought, as it was 6.1 degrees, maybe that rain wasn't as cold as I thought it would be.