Mr. Crabtree Goes Fishing

In October the weather is getting colder, autumn is truly underway the leaves are falling and nature is getting ready to sleep for the winter.  My mind turns towards a truly ferocious and fascinating fish called the Pike.  At this time of the year it is a great pleasure to fish for this hard fighting predator.

Where I live there is a wealth of waters within a twenty mile drive that have resident large pike including Knipton reservoir where many years ago I first became acquainted and at first terrified of this amazing fish.  If my memory serves me correctly it was an angler called Chris Hutchings who featured in the premier fishing paper of its time the angling times.  Within whose pages all manner of fishing stories pictures and reports inspired many of us to try different styles of angling.

I can remember reading and rereading the centre page spread of Chris reporting when he caught a near forty pound pike.  To my eyes this looked like a monster all head and teeth the pictures showed this huge head blood red gills and olive green body.  It looked alien compared to my usual fare of fish like roach,bream,and tench.  I had not realised our waters contained such monsters.  I went on to read various books about the subject getting more excited when I read accounts of how the pike will not only eat fish but will also take small waterfowl and water rats. Then there was the story of how one day at a cattle drink a large pike ripped off the nose of a cow.  Boy was I impressed with that it certainly got my imagination going overtime.

One book I remember In particular was an old fashioned illustrated story book called Mr Crabtree goes fishing by Bernard Venables.  This book showed you how to catch fish in an informative but exciting way leaving you with the feeling you had been there.  This series of books remain to this day as classics of angling literature and have the honour of introducing and inspiring many young children to the joys of fishing.  If you can get a copy it is still a good read and a lot of the information is still relevant today.