Myself and Stu managed a session ‘on the deads’ yesterday. Time really is critical at the moment for me with daily hospital visits to a a relative. Saturday evening I just managed to get some mackerel from Angling Direct on my way home from the hospital with 3 minutes to spare before they shut. Sunday I dragged my arse out of bed early and met Stu at our usual venue, a gravel pit we are very fortunate to have acces to. We lugged all our gear to the water’s edge and tackled up 2 rods each – one of mine being a brand new 12ft Shimano purist which I was hoping to Christen. My 1st rod I tackled up a standard float ledger but my 2nd I chose the Mick Brown stylee sunk float paternoster with added pencil float on top for visual detection.
We had bait in the water from 09:30 until around 4pm and we had not one offer between us. Nothing. Instead it was an opportunity to sit around drinking flask tea and moan about various old man ailments. As we were walking back to the car it struck me that there is a familiar pattern to blanking and it can be broken down into stages, much like the 5 stages of grief!
- Denial. – when you refuse to believe you are going to blank. Even whilst tackling down one rod, you leave the other out until the last minute and still believe a fish might hammer your bait right up until you have retrieved it to the bank. Give over and admit defeat you silly old bastard.
- Anger – “Fuck sake. We’ve spent 6 and a half hours with nothing to show for it. That’s a total pisstake
- Bargaining – “Actually, you know what, it’s not really about the fishing, it’s just nice to get out. Yeah for sure, been good to catch up, get some fresh air, catching fish would just have been a bonus….<interchangable with denial>
- Depression. Jesus Christ I am shit at pike fishing, I may as well throw all my tackle in the fucking lake and maybe myself as well.
- Acceptance. No, fuck it, it’s just pike fishing. At least I’m not a carp angler….
- Bonus stage – fading misery transitions to foolish optimism. “We need to try this bait/that rig/fish the other side of the lake next time. You’ll see! Today was merely a sacrifice to the angling Gods in order to enjoy success the next time we go pike fishing. God I love pike fishing. Can’t wait to go again!”