Life of a Chalkstream: How I forgot Jimmy Carter

Greetings!

I am not sure whether there is a timely moment to die but Jimmy Carter was on my mind when the news broke that he had died at the remarkable age of 100 years. I suspect he must be the oldest surviving US President ever though it is sobering to think Donald Trump will only be 17 years plus a few months off a century when he completes his second term.

But why was Carter on my mind? Well, very many of you had given his name as the answer in the Christmas Quiz asking who was the most recent holder of the US Presidential office to fish the River Test. This was not the answer I anticipated for the correct answer is George Bush Snr. who visited more than once in the 2000’s. In fact, I did not even know Jimmy Carter had fished the River Test which sent me to Google to discover where this factoid originated which unearthed the following article published in 2017 which I reproduce by way of small footnote to the President's life.

When Jimmy came to town

I sometimes wonder why fishing in Britain doesn't get more of a fair shake in the PR stakes when it comes to the sports and pastimes on our nation. You have to ask, is that down to us?

Last week we saw the hunters and fishers of the state of Michigan taking to the streets for the right to bear rods and arms. Now, you might well think in the current climate their passion is misdirected, but you can't argue with the passion. Maybe it speaks to a wider belief in the great outdoors that goes deeper in the US than it does in Britain which applies as much, it seems, to our leaders as us.

Believe or not in the post-war era more US Presidents have fished on the River Test than British Prime Ministers: George Bush Snr, Jimmy Carter and Dwight Eisenhower. Eisenhower was truly passionate about fly fishing; in his time as President he logged over forty fishing trips (mostly to Colorado) and taught Richard Nixon to fly cast, all in between 800 rounds of golf, a number only bettered by Barack Obama who took up fly fishing whilst in the White House.

And the British list? Well, it is hard enough to find much evidence of any fishing let alone chalkstream fishing of recent incumbents. Of Boris Johnson I can find nothing. On Theresa May, Gordon Brown, Tony Blair, John Major, Jim Callaghan, Ted Heath and Harold Wilson I have drawn a similar blank. I did read somewhere that Margaret Thatcher had one less-than-successful foray. David Cameron married as he is into the Astor family who own a good beat on the Spey, I would guess has had a flick or two.

In fact, you have to go all the way back to 1964 to find a Prime Minster photographed with rod in hand with Sir Alec Douglas-Hume who ended the continuous run of Downing Street anglers of Harold Macmillan (keen on shooting and golf as well), Anthony Eden, Winston Churchill and Neville Chamberlain. It was the last of these who was the most accomplished. Chamberlain is probably best remembered for his much derided 'peace in our time' photo op but a recent biography titled Neville Chamberlain: Angler, Birdwatcher, Farmer, Prime Minister offers a different side to him.

I was surprised to discover Churchill as a regular, but probably not passionate, fly fisher. He fished as a guest of hotelier Charles Ritz on the Normandy chalkstreams, caught a 188lb marlin off the Californian coast conducting the 30-minute fight from a boat dressed in a three-piece suit, bow tie and smoking a cigar. In 1943 when he travelled to address the US Congress, he and Roosevelt snuck off to the secret Presidential retreat in Maryland to fish. He wrote of the day,

"On Sunday the President wanted to fish in a stream which flowed through lovely woods. He was placed with great care by the side of a pool and sought to entice the nimble and wily fish. I tried for some time myself at other spots. No fish were caught, but he seemed to enjoy it very much, and was in great spirits for the rest of the day."

The naval aide tasked with looking after the pair reported that they had no problem with mosquitoes thanks to Churchill's cigar habit.

All sports need not just champions but championing to catch the public eye. The magic fairy dust of fame. Football has it in spades. Tennis, cricket, rugby, motor racing and horse racing all get their annual place in the sun. But fishing? The 3+ million of us who wander the banks seem untroubled by the lack of attention. Maybe that is to our credit?

Menu signed by Jimmy Carter during his stay in Hampshire in 1999

You may notice I have not credited anyone with the above article for the sad state of affairs is that the article is mine – I had clean forgotten that I had ever written it let alone recalled Jimmy Carter’s 1999 visit. In my defence, albeit a pretty feeble one, I have published over half a million words in the past decade, so thank you Google for knowing more about me than me.

Christmas Quiz answers & winner

There was a great response to the Christmas Quiz, so thanks to all who came in with twenty correct answers. However, as alluded above, it was mostly the US president question that tripped people up. The complete list of answers is below.

I really wanted the winner to be Neil Donkin who came up with the tie break caption, "Have you seen the size of Lawrence Gosden's [CEO of Southern Water] bonus?!" but sadly Neil had the wrong President. So, the winner is Richard Blake with the still excellent caption, “I think they have seen Prolific Rising Fish!”.

The signed Matt cartoon is on its way to you Richard – well done.

Angling literature

1) Who wrote A River Runs Through It?

2) Which innovative saltwater angler won a Nobel Prize for Literature?

3) Who wrote Fly Fishing (1899) but was also Foreign Secretary at the start of World War one?

4) The Compleat Angler was first published in what year?

5) Who wrote the poem The Brook that begins, “I come from haunts of coot and hern, ….”

1) Norman Maclean (1976) 2) Ernest Hemingway 3) Viscount Grey of Fallodon 4) 1653

5) Alfred, Lord Tennyson

Fish names

What is the English name for the following freshwater fish:

6) Salmo salar

7) Esox Lucius

8) Cyprinus carpio

9) Thymallus thymallus

10) Gasterosteidae

6) Atlantic salmon 7) Northern pike 8) Common carp 9) Grayling 10) Stickleback

Fishing personalities

11) Who are the stars of the Gone Fishing BBC TV series?

12) Which rock and roll legend caught the biggest Icelandic salmon of summer 2017?

13) Which member of Pink Floyd owns a house on the banks of the River Test?

14) Who was the most recent US President to fish the English chalkstreams?

15) What is the nationality of water campaigner Feargal Sharkey?

11) Bob Mortimer and Paul Whitehouse 12) Eric Clapton 13) Roger Waters 14) George W Bush Snr. 15) Northern Irish

Where in Britain

16) Which is the longest river in the British Isles?

17) Which is the largest lake (by surface area) in the British Isles?

18) Which is the longest road in the British Isles?

19) What species of tree is the oldest in the UK?

20) How long is the UK coastline? A) 5,073 miles B) 7,073 miles C) 9,073 miles D) 11,073 miles

16) River Severn at 220 miles just 5 miles longer than River Thames 17) Loch Neagh in Northern Ireland 18) The A1 or Great North Road at 410 miles (660 km) connecting London with Edinburgh. 19) The Fortingall Yew in Perthshire is believed to be the UK's oldest tree, with an estimated age between 2,000 and 3,000 years. 20) The Ordnance Survey places the length of the coastline at 11,073 miles

To rise or not to rise

My question about whether non-fertile triploid stocked trout were lazy risers prompted quite the postbag.

I think the first thing to say is that I was wrong in supposing no research has been done into the feeding habits of diploid vs. triploid and I am indebted to Shaun Leonard of the Wild Trout Trust who pointed me to a 2014 paper published in the Journal of Fish Biology. It was, admittedly, a tank based test over a six week period but concluded that, “findings suggest that sterile triploid S. trutta feed similarly ….. to diploid trout”.

I am inclined to go with this because a common theme in many of your comments was the lack of rising fish being notable on both stocked and all wild rivers. So, if it is not the fish what is it? I know it is tempting to leap to the conclusion that it is the demise of insect life with all the data pointing to a catastrophic decline in the scale and variety of entomological life in our lifetimes.

But I have to counter that I often I stand by a river with huge hatches that last for ages but nary a creature moves. However, what I do know is that there is a whole palette of insects fish never, or at least very rarely, (think Alder fly) eat. Maybe, to repurpose that old British Rail excuse, hatches are now the wrong kind of insects, the ones trout really like having been decimated by pollution.