Angling Art

I was browsing the Daily Paintworks website when I came across this gem. What a wonderful study - who'd have thought something so unremarkable as a two cent plastic bobber could be elevated to a thing of beauty. Keep 'em coming Qiang.

Old Dogs

A good friend and I fished the big ol’ Mayfly hatch this weekend. We trundled over to the river, going nice and slow in ‘The Van Formerly Known As Bobby’, stopping off briefly at a junction where the road switches over the river. One route takes you to the best trout and grayling beats at the edges of the Peak District National Park, while the other route takes you up and out of the valley to the beautiful Carsington Water. We were traveling out after several days of rain that might have rendered the river unfishable so we’d allowed ourselves the option of taking a boat out on the reservoir. Our stop-off was to check the river to see which road we should take. Remarkably the flow was perfect so we headed in the direction of Bakewell.

Taking it easy (middle age does have some advantages over youth) it took us a while to get down to the river, and though the hike to the bank showed no drakes other than the feathered variety, the scene at the river presented a pleasant contrast. In the heavy damp atmosphere beneath a low cloud canopy the mayflies were hanging around on the water and close to the banks. Naturally, the fish were having a party!

To cut a long story short, Simon and I joined the party and I guess we spoiled it for plenty of those fish. So many came to the dry fly that counting the catch would have been a chore. While catching so many was fun enough, I’ll just make mention of a couple of fish worthy of note.

Simon and I’ve been fishing the river together now for at least thirteen years, and I’ve been fishing it for as long as I’ve been fly-fishing. In all that time we’ve always caught the largest fish at this time of year, or at the shoulders of the season, when the fish are either ravenous or just plain aggressive. Up until last year our record for the venue stood at 2 and 2½ pounds respectively, Simon holding the record. Well, yesterday we smashed both our records with substantially larger fish.

Unfortunately we have only one-another to corroborate our story and a tape measure to estimate the sizes. One of the disadvantages of getting older in acquiring the propensity to forget things, and on this occasion we both forgot our cameras! So now we have only memories.

The fish were fit mature males that under most conditions would have never risen to a dry fly. Not unlike a few other bedazzled fish the spell of a fat mayfly hatching all nice and slow obviously proved a little too tempting for the old dogs, rewarding a couple of even older dogs with the catch of a lifetime. We estimate the fish to have been 2¾ and 3¼ pounds (they measured 20" and 21"), and Simon still holds the record (Beer later was on him!). Both fell to a couple of home tied flies, Mayfly Emergers.

You may be glad to know that both fish were out of the water only briefly. They were successfully returned to fight another day and to continue the line of beautiful wild Derbyshire brown trout.

"Clever little fish!"

My daily read the Metro is running a piece on training fish. I quote:

He can shoot hoops, slip through a slalom and is limber at limbo – the only obstacle to global sports stardom is that Comet lives in a tank.

The goldfish has been trained to perform a range of tricks, debunking the myth of a three-second memory.

His owner, Dr Dean Pomerleau, gave him a piece of food every time he correctly performed a trick.

I wonder does this backup angler's claims that fish can be clever. If a goldfish can be trained then does it follow that a trout for instance can acquire skills. Allowing that the fish would have to be caught and released several times in order to reach the point of enlightenment, could it actually learn to distinguish between real food and artificial offerings. Or is it simply that the fish doesn't recognise an artificial as food at all because the likeness is so far out?

Chicken or Egg?

At some point or other you've gotta have debated it. Maybe over a late night beer when conversation was getting sketchy.

It's a debate which just won't go away. Which came first: the chicken or the egg? Well, Prof John Brookfield, one of the School of Biology's resident population geneticists, is hoping he can sort out an answer once and for all. Find out what John had to say to Chris Evans on the subject on [BBC] Radio 2.

(School of Biology, University of Nottingham)

Wildlife Force

On my morning commute, I pass through the centre of the city of Nottingham where I collect a free copy of Metro. Reading the newspaper helps pass the time on route to the biology department of the university where I work. Mostly the paper is pretty dire but it does host a small section centred on environmental topics. A couple weeks ago, there was a short piece on the Wildlife Force webcam project based in the Amazon rainforest. Being recommended by David Attenborough I figured the website had to worth a look.

Now, I've seen a few hummingbirds around a feeder at a friends house in Minneapolis, but down there in the Amazon they get ten or twenty at a time, at least! It's amazing. I was so impressed by the project that also looks at reforestation at the Buenaventura reserve, funded by World Land Trust, that I was inspired to respond to the Get Involved message on the website.

Being one for accessible website design I first offered a few technical suggestions to the folks running the project.... things like avoiding scrolling divs (You techy people will know what I'm talking about.). Anyway, in the end, rather than just offer advice, I thought I'd put my money where my mouth is. I offered to rewrite the CSS and some of the HTML for the site. It took me a little longer than I thought it might - no surprise there - but in the end the site ended up working more or less the same across the browsers and validating with W3C. Hopefully my aim to help the website provide better access will support further success in the project.

Go take a look if not to support the project then at least because it's just plain fascinating.... did you ever see so many hummingbirds in such close quarters!?

Saved by Trout

"When he realized what he had, he spun a 180, and took off downstream like a rocket! The drag screamed that sweet string symphony in my ears, but I couldn't see my rod". A man saved by a trout, Jerry Giles with a tale of risk and adventure... Read the full story »