How did you come to take up fishing?
Who introduced you to it, and what influence from them remains in your fishing today?
I was super blessed that my father was an angler. Of course, that doesn’t mean it’s a given that I would have fallen in love with it because he also took both my brother and sister fishing and, although they enjoyed fishing with their dad, I just gravitated towards it differently. Dad was really into his fly fishing in the very early years, but with the style of casting involved, it was way too tricky for a young boy to get his head around. Instead, I would spend hours catching bugs, hunting for fossils, and building up my own fly collection by trawling the hedgerows and bushes for any that had been ‘lost’. We would go together almost every weekend, much to the disappointment of a hundred times “I must get an early night”, then of course not being able to sleep with the thoughts spinning round my head of just how amazing tomorrow is going to be – “I’m going fishing with my Dad”.
The alarm clock going off and that feeling of being up all night, having not been able to sleep, but I still had that massive smile on my face! Getting up for a fishing trip never has been and never will be a chore – in fact, I’d go as far as saying that feeling when you first open your eyes and you know that today you’re going FISHING all day – that’s one hell of a BUZZ!
The morning of a trip was always in total darkness, the car would be loaded, the list ticked off, a flask of soup made and then a BIG DRIVE! Back then for a young boy, car journeys took forever even though they were only around ninety minutes to get to the reservoirs up in Northamptonshire! Leaving and driving in darkness, at a time of day when the rest of the world is sleeping means all the animals are out to play and I’d plead with Dad to drive as many winding and twisting single track backroads as possible as we hunted for badgers, deer, foxes and barn owls – this was and still is a big part of it for me!
As much as these adventures as a young boy were great, Dad quickly realised that although fly fishing was off the table for me, I could certainly fish with a float rod and actually catch something for myself. We began to fly fish less and less as he got all the coarse gear back out and I really began my angling apprenticeship; a journey he started for me and we’re still sharing together to this day – some thirty-five years later. The first place he ever took me where I could actually hold the rod, watch the float disappear and strike for the very first time myself, was Adam’s Mill on the River Ouse. We spent a couple of hours float fishing, and just as I loved discovering all the bugs and fossils, I soon became fascinated with the underwater world. I caught a minnow, then a perch, a gudgeon, a roach, a dace, a small chublet – it was an aquarium, it was the Ouse in its prime, the smell of the weir pool, the solitude and the silence – it was just me and my dad as he taught me what it meant to be an angler.
I think the standout lessons from those very early angling experiences were, and still are, to treasure every special moment; the nature and wildlife, the sunrises and sunsets. To truly know why you’re doing it; why are you getting up at silly o-clock, even in the most dreadful weather? I know why I do it; I’m going on a massive adventure!
I’m hunting, and not just hunting for the end prize of the capture, I’m hunting all the ‘buzzes’ and I’m searching for all the bits in between too!
The friendship, the sights, the emotional rollercoaster, the shock moments when a big fish hits the surface or you get a bite from out of nowhere! I’m there to make it happen, work it out, crack the code, understand more, learn more, get better, constantly improve! Dad made me really competitive and I don’t hate him for it, in fact he stands NO CHANCE against me now but it was him who drilled in to me “we’re here to catch” – we NEVER went fishing to ‘chill out’ – we went fishing to succeed in whatever today’s mission was, and in terms of a measure of success, there was no greater one than out-fishing the others around you, and ultimately, the battle between father and son of who was the better angler on that day. Dad pushed me to get better, experience new challenges, new waters, new species and that LOVE for anything to do with fishing – YES, I became obsessed!
As the years went on, we fished together relentlessly, coarse fishing, aspiring to catch bigger specimens, he took me to countless matches, sea fishing, carp fishing, night fishing – we did ALL the fishing together, all the weekends, after school, days off school to fish on my birthdays, ALL the holidays! So yeah, I had the best dad ever but I absolutely have to shout out to my Mum too, who also went way above and beyond to support my love for it. She would do anything to help me with my fishing and always listened with intent as I’d blurt it all out at a million miles an hour as soon as I arrived home. It’s Mum who can take so much of the credit for getting me to where I am today, encouraging me massively to follow my dreams and, absolutely crucially in terms of helping and guiding me, to “Be happy and do a job you love” – she was absolutely instrumental in that even though she wasn’t the angler!
Nowadays, I’m primarily seen as a carp angler through my role at Nash Tackle, social media, YouTube etc but the greatest gift my Dad ever gave me was my love for simply FISSSSSSSHHHHHHHHIIIINNNNGGGGG – that buzz still burns as brightly as it ever did and long may it continue!
Fishing is THE best thing ever, but something that great can’t come without some negatives and one of those is other anglers! Those ‘other anglers’ could be your closest friends, even your father! To me, another angler is immediately a threat (thanks Dad, for that competitive streak) and as much as almost ALL of my greatest memories have been shared with others, my closest friends and for MANY years with Chloe (In fact, they wouldn’t even be remotely as good memories if those people were not present)… when it comes down to FISHING, that almost ‘evil’ selfishness can creep in, and it can be hard to manage from time to time.
Of course, I can celebrate another angler’s capture. I spend most of my time fishing with others and I wouldn’t change it for the world, but I’d be lying if I said it’s the ‘darker’ side to being an angler! I’ve done my fair share of stroke pulling and sheeping up in order to be in the mix, catch what I want (even to the wife) – it can be brutal, so as the years have gone by, I have tried to separate out my angling as to not create friction with people I hold dear. I’m good for sharing takes, working as a team, pulling together for the greater good, but there are times when I want to be alone, a big job on, a big prize at the end of it all… sometimes I’d rather just be me versus the fish! I think as long as I know what the craic is, where I stand, then I go about my fishing, having the loveliest of times and, along with my own personal captures, some of my greatest memories have been whilst sharing someone else’s buzz, and in some instances really assisting them to have caught the fish of their dreams.
What is your favourite fishing memory, and what makes it so special?
My fondest, and also most challenging, fishing memory is actually a really rare one, because in this instance, I was all alone fishing for brown trout in New Zealand.
I was completely out of my depth. I might be able to cast a fly with open banks behind me, but the intimate rivers required technical casts which was a crucial skill I didn’t possess in that kind of environment. I had watched countless YouTube videos, trying to imitate the experts, fishing with nymphs as it was ‘meant’ to be done. Every day, I tried to catch one, and every day, I failed. I could find the fish no problem—the water was gin-clear—but my lack of ability, combined with being stuck on the idea of nymphing, held me back. It wasn’t until I was about to head home to the UK that I made a change – more out of desperation rather than reason. Instead of persisting with the nymphs, I tied on a large dry fly, made the cast, and the trout took it. I will never forget that feeling of it rising up to take the fly, the strike, the connection, the eruption, fighting that fish in the upper reaches of the river with a fine leader and me up to my waist with just some Air Max trainers on my feet getting dragged all over the place! Man, it was the ultimate buzz and it was because it drew on all of the emotions you ever experience as an angler of just how difficult catching a fish can sometimes be, and just how incredible it feels when you do get it right! That trout will take some beating in terms of a fish that REALLY meant something special!
Your energy and motivation are inspirational. How do you maintain this when the going gets tough, either in life or on the bank?
I’ve always tried extremely hard in every aspect of my life, whether it be work or fishing. Fishing obviously came before work, and that appreciation of it ‘not being called catching, it’s called fishing’ meant that if you therefore wanted to catch, you had to work bloody hard at it. ‘Nothing good in life comes easy’ is also relevant, and although Mum and Dad both worked hard, we were not wealthy by any means – every pint of maggots, bag of groundbait, each new lure, all came through hard work and the many paper rounds I held down. Every birthday and Christmas gift would be seen as an opportunity to further bolster the collection of fishing tackle I was acquiring to allow me to continue to develop as an angler. Further down the line with Nash Tackle, I simply want the brand to be the best it can be, and to have a meaningful impact on the people who buy our products or follow our journey.
I believe the ethos that runs through Nash—‘make it happen’—is key. Kevin Nash, as the head of the business, has embodied this mindset, and it has always resonated with me deeply.
No matter the situation—whether the fish aren’t playing ball or we’re trying to solve a challenge at work—I turn to that ‘roll your sleeves up and get the job done’ mentality. I believe that striving to do better and pushing yourself is crucial. Even if I only get seventy-five percent of the way to my goal, that’s still far better than settling for half-hearted effort and achieving even less.
My dreams are big, unrealistic, some would say borderline crazy, but bloody hell, who really wants to fish the same syndicate for the rest of their lives or do the same job day in day out?
Most have to, that’s life for most, but for me it hasn’t and never will be an option.
Life can be bloody difficult at times – you won’t see it if you watch the YouTube videos or Instagram stories; I wouldn’t want to bring that negative side of life to viewers, but the reality is we all have to sail the rough with the smooth. Nashy tells me it’s called ‘character building’ and I think he’s right. When the going gets tough, you pick yourself up, get that smile out, you go again – whether that’s one more lap in search of them, just a few more hours drowning in excel sheets, or realising that it doesn’t matter how long your day’s been – you’ve got a family at home that needs you too!
Life is hard work but what an amazing thing we’ve got in front of us! There are opportunities everywhere; you need to just realise them, embrace them, enjoy them, navigate through it all being the best version of yourself you can and catch as many fish as you can along the way.
Can you describe your approach to watercraft when fishing for the first time on a new water?
My fishing varies hugely – one minute I’m fishing a small stream in the UK, the next I’m boat fishing on a ten thousand acre lake in Europe. But the approach always remains the same: find the fish. It’s an obvious principle and written about daily in fishing media, but it’s crucial—you can’t catch what isn’t there. Don’t get me wrong, sometimes I can’t find them and I get that – it’s all part of the graft! The part I do occasionally still get wrong, is not finding them because I didn’t search,and that’s just not good enough! Instead
I went with a preconceived idea, I’d dreamt up the session all week, planned it out in my head – where I thought they would be, arrive at the venue and instead of going off in pursuit I let my ‘dreams’ come alive and I jump in my preconceived swim instead of the swim where the fish actually are! It’s not the right way to angle! The fish must be found first, I must do everything I can to believe in my swim choice.
I’ve seen something, heard something – not just on gut or because it’s where my imagination thinks the fish are.
Even if I arrive at a lake in darkness, I will walk around and listen for signs of fish, using a super bright head torch to check snags and margins for activity. If the lake is large and I’m using a boat, I break it into sections and use watercraft to identify the most promising areas. Being on the water allows me to locate spots where fish might frequent, identify areas recently fed on, or even spot fish drifting around. Once I find the fish, the process becomes much easier but nothing comes before ‘where are they’. I often use the analogy of the house we all live in – there will be bedrooms, a bathroom, a toilet, the loft, hallways, landings, living room, kitchen, study, garage, garden etc. There will be areas in your house where you spend a great deal of time, and other areas where you spend very little, if any at all, and some of those areas are merely to get from room A to room B! This is exactly the same with the fish we are angling for. Firstly, the venue these fish are living in is their home, they know every inch of it! There are areas in that venue where they will spend a great deal of time, other areas are merely routes they use and some areas they do not frequent at all! As an angler I need to identify their patrol routes, where do they go during darkness, where do they go when the sun is shining, are they on the wind, off the wind, where are the natural food larders, where do they go when there are high levels of angling pressure… and of course this location and watercraft changes and evolves as the seasons do too! Summer watercraft is very different to winter watercraft and one would argue way harder in the winter, but WOW, if you can locate your quarry in the cold, odds are they are not venturing far from that area and you can experience some truly magical fishing even in the depths of winter!
As mentioned above, my downfall as an angler (depending on who is reading this!) is the fact I haven’t yet fully embraced tech into my fishing! If I’m out on the boat then I’ve got my easy to use underwater camera which has caught me STACKS of fish which I’m sure I wouldn’t have caught without it, but that’s about as far as my tech goes! If I incorporated a drone into my fishing my results would sky rocket, just as they would with a ‘Deeper’ or any echo-sounding device for that matter and, at the top of the tech tree, there’s live scoop which is just the pinnacle of tech within angling! I don’t not use them because I’m a purist or traditionalist – I don’t use them because tech just isn’t for me – it’s all just a bit too complicated, and although it would make my fishing way easier, I just haven’t got the capacity to want to learn and understand what all the different buttons and settings actually do. For someone who prides themselves on doing the best I can, the fact I’ve not yet embraced this level of tech into my angling is actually nothing other than laziness and I’m embarrassed writing it! Through my own ignorance I tell myself I’d still actually rather walk around a hundred acre pit, I’d rather cut my arms and legs up in the brambles, I’d rather push my way through the reeds and find the mother load in front of my own eyes! It’s the same out in the boat; I like using my prodding stick, I like seeing things appear on my tiny underwater camera screen, I simply love drifting around in the moment, learning as I go, putting the pieces together, but the reality is, I’m just too lazy to add another string to my bow.
How important is a sense of mystery in your fishing?
Do you prefer to have tangible information about what’s beneath the surface, or do you enjoy pondering the possibilities?
The mystery is what you make of it, although the majority of European venues are well-documented, and you can often get a good idea of the fish stock, their names and when they were last caught (certainly within carp fishing anyway). In that sense, there isn’t too much mystery left. However, for me, the mystery lies in arriving at a lake and figuring it out for myself. The vast majority of my fishing over the last twenty years has been at venues I will never visit again! Because of the constant change and varied venues I fish, both in the UK and abroad, each has its own unique characteristics from extreme urban city environments to savage wild rivers; all of which adds a huge element of mystery. The fish might not play by the rule book, angling pressure may have changed their habits and mystery doesn’t have to just involve what lies beneath in terms of the fish themselves – it can just be solving the mystery on that particular day of how to get a bite or even find them in the first place. Then there’s all the other species! Let’s say I’m actually fishing the venue for carp but then discover shoals of unpressured giant roach or I’m dace fishing but stumble across stone loach, or, at completely the other end of the scale, what is swimming around our shores in terms of the various shark species and ginormous bluefin tuna! It’s easy to get sucked into the ‘it-isn’t-what-it-used-to-be brigade’ until you take a step out of one particular genre or group of friends and go WOW, FISHING is still literally full of mystery if you look for it.
The further I’ve travelled, the more mystery I’ve found – incredible species which at the time of capture you don’t even know the name of, didn’t even know it existed – this is still super-special to me, much like that first time coarse fishing with Dad and him identifying all that is out there to catch! I’m just not one to repeatedly fish a venue time and time again, there is just too much varied fishing out there for me to get caught up deep in just one water, one specific campaign after one target fish. I’m just not that guy! To be at that level in your angling requires a very special human indeed, and I’ve seen first hand just how high up the levels chart some will go to target the very biggest out there, having had the privilege to fish with and follow anglers like Dave Robinson over the last few years! There’s fishing, and then there’s FISSSSSHHHHHIIINNNNGGGGGGG! Maybe one day I’ll get to that place in my angling or want to be that angler, because as I say, that right there is a whole new level of doing what you love!
If I look back over the last fifteen years where almost all of the fishing I’ve done has been work related as opposed to angling for pleasure, and the journey I’ve been on, has all been tailored towards freedom, a sense of the unknown, adventure and mystery. Urban Banx was just that – who actually knew what was in those tiny tidal ditches, grotty park lakes, industrial stretches of canals etc – I certainly didn’t and I loved finding out. Euro Banx and those road trips with Oli [Davies] will be ingrained into my heart forever, and what a series of adventures we had! They became more and more ridiculous in terms of time away, distance travelled, countries visited and breathtaking venues we angled at but the most ridiculous and extreme of all was driving all the way to Montenegro and Albania to lake Skadar and we never even cast a line – that’s one where the mystery very much still needs exploring! The sense of mystery was everywhere we travelled,completely off the chart, and although some of the venues like Lake Bled were already on the radar of carp anglers – I’m sure in some instances we caught fish that had never seen a hook before and fished spots no angler had ever even dreamt of plotting up at and chucking a pop-up out! In more recent times we created the trilogy of ‘Borrowed Times’ films which were again all about bringing some of that mystery back without having to travel thousands of miles to find it. Venues in the UK, off the beaten track, untrodden banks, peace, quiet, solitude. But as anyone reading this knows, or anyone who has watched the films – these venues don’t come around every year, and then someone turns up and makes a film there completely destroying any mystery the place had which took me there in the first place! This is another very awkward part of angling for me! I want the mystery more than most but then I go and ruin the mystery by publicising it to a wider audience. I don’t want to be a gatekeeper but I also NEVER want anyone to have their own mystery ruined because of me… I hate this part of what I do, I’m genuinely sorry when I do this to another angler… as I said previously, life isn’t as easy as it always looks!
Which brings me up to the current time and where my biggest adventures still chasing that mystery are now heading! The last couple of years have seen us create a new series on Nash TV – ‘Beyond Banks’ which see’s me travel beyond Europe to even crazier countries, kind of the last place you’d even think about going carp fishing! Episode one saw Dan and I travel to the Azores, which is a series of islands out in the ocean between Portugal and America, exploring four of the lakes on just one of the islands in just four days. It was absolutely incredible, the scenes, up in the mountains, the sulphuric geezers, the almost rainforest environment and the bloody carp! We caught LOADS, no monsters but it truly was pioneering stuff. That adventure ended by flying from the Azores to Portugal and then onto Tenerife where we took a ferry to the island of La Gomera, up to the top of another mountain to this time fish for ancient mirror carp – carp of dreams for sure!
Another massive dream come true for me was Japan; this time with Marc Voosen. We took our fishing paraphernalia on the plane and as much bait as we could squeeze into any remaining gaps in our luggage. We touched down in Tokyo, hired a couple of little Nissans, and went on the biggest adventure of our life; driving around Japan from the busiest cities to by far the biggest lake I’d ever fished, tiny ditches and urban tidal harbours – Japan oozed mystery and, although I said that
I wouldnt t like to go back, Japan is different! Never before have I experienced a whole nation with angling so deeply ingrained into its culture – vibes, on vibes on vibes. It goes without saying,
I cannot wait until the next chapter and where the next episode might take us!
Though you are primarily known for your carp fishing and role with Nash Tackle, you also do a lot on the rivers chasing barbel and other species. Tell us what running water offers to you and why you seek this out amidst your stillwater carping.
It goes back again to that first session on Adams Mill, the smell of the weir pool, pushing your way through nettles taller than you, mesmerised by the flow, the current, the eddies, the slacks, the all important crease… I believe that fishing a river is simply harder to tackle than a lake and therefore the rewards are greater and the sense of achievement is higher for me. A 10lb river carp means way more to me than a 20lb carp from a lake. I don’t like to have to measure my fishing in that way but that’s a fact to me and, at the end of the day, I do it for a sense of achievement. I like the closed season too! I like the build up to the start as much as I like the build up to the end.
I love them in the winter (when they’re fishable) because when the fish in a lake switch off as they go into that state of hibernation, the fish in a river are that little bit more obliging and therefore they give me the ability to fish right through the twelve months. I really appreciate those glistening pure white mornings and burning sunsets whilst other anglers are simply waiting for their season to start. As an angler, and even though there is a closed season on a river, it’s ironically the river that lets me fish all year round. As for the other species – Jeez, a river just offers so much more diversity when compared to a stillwater – I can catch all the lake species in a river but not all the river species in a lake, and without labouring the same points – I’m searching for variety in my angling, I’m searching for mystery – the river more often than not offers me that way more than a lake can. The banks are quieter, the walks are longer, the adventure is bigger, the battles are harder. If I had one more day to fish for sure it would be on the river rather than on a lake.
Aside from being a mentor in running Nash Tackle as a business, what have you learned from Kevin Nash as an angler?
WOW! I’ve learnt so much from this man, Chloe even says “you’re just like Nashy” but when she says it it’s not meant positively! I’ll try to keep it fishing related but there are also the lessons in life, lessons in being a good human, lessons in friendship, love even, understanding the world around me and how to LIVE – they have far outweighed any insights I’ve gleaned from him for my own angling. THANK YOU Kev, what a bloody great life we’ve had!
When I first met Kev, in terms of carp fishing anyway – I didn’t really know my arse from my elbow! All the gear, no idea! It had somewhat overwhelmed me, confused me, I’d forgotten all the important aspects of being an angler and just wanted to be a bloody carp angler. More pop-ups, more spods, more rigs, trickier venues…
I was confused, robotic in my approach and very easily influenced by what I’d read in a magazine. Kev brought me back to reality as we spent many years fishing together and for sure taught me so much about watercraft, location, rig mechanics, bait confidence, establishing a bait, indication, having an edge and importantly keeping it close to your chest, monopolising success above all else – together we went in search of mystery and adventure.
We were a good team in more ways than one, we both brought something to the party and enjoyed each other’s success as we flitted around on syndicates, wild pits and even some incredible adventures a long way from home. They were golden years for me, everything was new – understanding the mindset behind the ‘blow out tube’ rig, how important hook sharpness really was, how carp, or any fish for that matter, could ‘get away with it’. Just like my dad, Kev gave me all the time in the world and taught me almost everything about carp fishing other than stalking and floater fishing! He was an OG veteran, and I was at his side every single day, whether that was in the office, walking our dogs together, or deep in the reeds somewhere planning our next move – thank you Kev, one-in-a-million you, mate!
If you could use one method to catch a carp, what would it be and why?
There’s nothing quite like a hazy summer’s morning, drifting floaters over the top of a huge weedbed as the first one slurps one down, then another, and another – you’ve got them up early, before anyone else is awake, even the gulls.
I continue to feed, more and more, they’re out there and going absolutely crazy and they’re gooduns too, backs are now breaking the surface, they’re actively looking for the next floater. Right before your eyes absolute CARNAGE is about to commence! For me, you just can’t beat a bloody good surface-fishing smash-up whilst everyone else is still tucked up in their bivvy! The excitement of being able to see everything unfold, you can regulate the feed, you can make them hungry and there will never be a more heart racing moment in my angling than teasing my hookbait into the zone knowing it’s GOING TO GET NAILED!
Of course, if I can just calm down a bit, focus, then you can also use moments like this hugely to your advantage to catch the one you really want, the biggun, the fully, the long common, the koi – which ever one it is, floater fishing and stalking allows you to be selective and this is rare in our angling. I can specifically catch the one I really want and it doesn’t involve days or even weeks of sitting there ‘praying’ it will happen. All the cards are in my hands, and the only thing preventing success over failure is my ability, my next move, me not messing things up! This is as exciting as it gets for me. There is only one reason why if tomorrow was my last day fishing that I wouldn’t choose this style of angling over going to the river; because this is exactly what I would be doing on the river if I could too! Long trots with bread on the surface, the chub smashing at pieces and the carp slurping it down. Surface fishing and specifically bread-fishing a river really is THE ONE for me; that’s my ultimate angling experience, accessible to almost all of us, unlike a giant tarpon in Florida or a huge Siamese carp from Thailand – just drifting bread down the river is more than enough to really get the heart racing.
What is your favourite venue?
Do you have a particular memory about being there?
Many years ago now a great friend, ‘Ditch’, took me barbel fishing for the very first time (well, when I actually caught my very first one)! I need to explain this experience a little better because even though I grew up fishing the river Ouse, which at the time was the greatest barbel fishing our country had to offer, NEVER did Dad and I go barbel fishing! It was so similar to what I had read in the early carp fishing books about how anglers used to think carp were uncatchable creatures! Dad and I thought the same about the barbel, they were out of our league, and although we had caught plenty of barbel from commercial fisheries, for whatever reason we’d never actually targeted them.
It wasn’t until I was in my early twenties and met Ditch, that he took me to the upper reaches of the River Lea, where he had told me of sessions rolling meat that had accounted for as many as fifteen barbel in a one session! Of course, this was hard for me to comprehend, having never even caught one from the river but wow, I jumped at the chance to experience it! He wasn’t wrong either – these things could be caught, they weren’t the mythical species I’d led myself to believe and with a can of spam and some stealthy footwork you could in fact catch barbel with relative ease, and a whole lot of excitement. Ditch showing me the upper Lea led to many more years of me exploring its banks, most of the time wading the shallow water drifting bread on the surface for the carp and chub and rolling meat for the barbel. As is often the way in our fishing, it’s not always text book and there were times when I caught the barbel off the surface and the carp rolling the meat! I know the main Lea itself, and of course the relief channel, are shrouded in historical captures, none more so than the last couple of years from somewhere I am very privileged to have a ticket; the incredible Kings Weir stretch, but there is something about the upper reaches that just make me happy. The gin-clear water, streamer weed, huge beds of watercress, gravel glides and runs, and big fish for such a tiny, intimate water course! I’ve had summer chub to nearly 6lb, carp over 20lb and barbel just shy of double figures from stretches you could almost jump across! It’s hard for me to have fonder memories of such up close and personal fishing for a variety of species, when it’s you versus the fish and not another soul around.
It’s great that you take your family fishing. What do you hope your children will take from these experiences?
Before Chloe and I had the girls, we had already spent more than ten years fishing together a lot. When the girls were born, they were of course thrust into a world of angling which even crossed over the line into the world of YouTube videos as another series of films were created, entitled ‘family fishing’. Just like my dad did for me, both Chloe and I made the fishing trips into a huge adventure from campfires to boating out onto islands, swimming with the fish, to the girls learning how to catch them for themselves.
They absolutely LOVE nature, so much so that they both decided to become vegan for the simple fact they deeply care about living things, and importantly the environment they live in.
It’s a weird one isn’t it, they won’t eat chocolate, won’t have a milkshake, won’t smash a steak anymore but still relish in sticking a hook into something for their own pleasure!!! As I write this down, the whole thing comes across as truly baffling. But that right there is the power of fishing – it gives you the deepest love for environments, the ecosystems, respect, to nurture something, to care for something, even though the underlying perception of the non-angling fraternity is that ‘it’s cruel’. I’ve referenced above that I know exactly what I’m doing and why I’m doing it, in terms of a moral compass, and my girls, now aged nine and ten, have their own moral compasses installed too. Whilst they want to preserve our ozone layer way more than myself and Chloe care (we are absolutely not vegan and continue to dine as we please), they still absolutely LOVE going fishing because it puts them into a world of excitement way beyond what ‘Roblox’ will ever give them: the real life thrill-of-the-chase, the unknown, the adventure, ALL that incredible nature directly around you, to the point you’re now cradling something you have caught yourself from the underwater world. I believe fishing has been an integral part of them becoming the super-caring good beings they are, and will continue to be, and both Chloe and I are super-glad that fishing is something we can all do together as a family.
Do you have any hopes for the future of our sport?
Quite simply, that it does not ever end, and that generation after generation get to experience what I, anyone reading this and the generations before us have had the opportunity to experience. As I hope I’ve highlighted, fishing has given me way more than just an album full of captures and long may that buzz continue beyond my last cast.
What ambitions remain in your own angling?
Where would I even start when trying to answer this?I literally want to do it all! The rivers and the giant huchen, the mangroves on the edge of the rainforests for the peacock bass, cutting a hole in the ice for the very first time, going out onto the ocean for days at a time in search of fish bigger than even my wildest imagination… I want to do it all!
In reality, I want Nash to continue to thrive and flourish, I want a family when I do arrive back home, so it’s all about that word – balance! As long as I have a trip planned, no matter how big or small, I can conform to the real world, to normality, to society and dream my way to that next session, wherever that may be.
Piscator 