Return of the three legged dog

This is a favourite piece of writing from a couple of years ago.

It may be a bit of an Angler's tall tale but there used to be a three legged dog that hung around the shoreline of a local freshwater lake.

It was friendly enough but to those sat quietly, fishing those well stocked waters, it seemed a bit anxious as though looking for something. It was from this that the narrative arose that the dog had been swimming in the weedy shallows when a large Pike, a notorious predator fish, had bitten off one of its hind legs, decisively and clinically.

That sort of story, whether in fact true or a yarn, fable, rumour or outright fabrication has given to the Pike an enthralling reputation. It is fearsome and to be feared.

It's latin name, Esox Lucius, roughly translates to devil fish, which alludes to the myth,legend and also the factual and real life of this species.

I have had some personal experience of the creature.

In my early teenage years I was a keen but rather chaotic angler. It was actually a genetic thing inherited in a much diluted form from my maternal Grandfather, Dick. After he died I took on some of his beloved fishing rods and tackle and found out for myself about the joy and peacefulness of sitting on a riverbank for hour upon hour.

It was not really that important to catch anything, rather just to gather your thoughts, drink pop, eat sandwiches, play with warm, bran covered maggots and watch the world flow by on a slow current.

I started to buy the Angling Times to give some credibility to my bungling, amateur status as a freshwater fisher and in those pages I built up a startling image of the Pike. Grainy photos of successful catches loomed out of the pages of that publication. The Pike weighing down the two arms of beefy angler types were all huge.

I became obsessed with finding out more about this natural predator in typical schoolboy fervour following on from a similar all encompassing thirst for facts on the Bermuda Triangle, UFO's, the assassination of JFK and how to become an Astronaut.

You would not expect narrow, fairly shallow and typically slow flowing English rivers to be able to sustain, yet contain, a fish of the voracity of appetite of the Pike.

It has the appearance of a prehistoric origin, a crocodilian head, pits in the flesh of the skull acting as a sounding board to detect its prey, large pear- shaped amber and black centred eyes to scour the depths, an intriguing dappled olive skin with golden dots and dashes to provide clever camouflage in the weeds and yet mimicking the effect of sunlight on the water, a multiple array of teeth with an inward slant to ensure that snagged prey, once impaled, had little chance of wriggling free, fins mounted towards its hind quarters to give powerful rear engined thrust for a short burst from hiding place to target and all of these attributes in a long, efficient and sleek, shiny body.

Amongst the rather, by comparison, feeble and comical fish such as Ruff, Gudgeon, Roach, Rudd, Bream, Carp and even the Eel it is a totally unexpected resident in Northern European waters. It has undoubtedly thrived with a life expectancy of up to 25 years and with recorded sizes up to a whopping seventy pounds.

It's technique for hunting is aggressive but clever and patient. It secretes itself in the weeds and just sits and waits until an unwitting prey swims past. In a powering up of the fins and a lighting fast strike it ensures a regular diet of smaller fish but is also known to take ducks and of course 25% of a dog's appendages.

Some individual Pike have been more ambitious and fearless.

Anglers have recounted tales of being bitten as a consequence of a Pike attempting to steal away the catch at the end of the line. Divers working on bridge piers report being head-butted by large Pike in a sort of territorial stance. There have also been tales of mules and cattle taking water in a river and being attacked.

In history the species were prized by Monarchs and the Landed Classes as food and many Castles and Manor Houses had Pike or Stew Ponds as they were called as a source of what was regarded as a delicacy. The rather earthy, small bone latticed meat was quite an acquired taste.

In my youth, a friend caught a Pike and decided to take it home for his Mum to cook. He had struggled to land it as Pike are strong game fish but then knocked it on the head before placing it length-ways, head down in his backpack. On the cycle ride back to his house the fish regained consciousness and a panicked lad had to go through the process again on the busy roadside. He didn't say anything about eating it after that.

A Pike could be caught at any time in the freshwater season but pursuit of the species in the cold, damp winter months was the best of activities.

Armed with brightly coloured spoon or small fish shaped spinning lures we would cover many miles along the river bank in search of the creatures.

Alternatively we would buy a pound weight of Sprats from the fishmongers and carefully attach them as dead bait to the biggest hooks we could manage.

Unfortunately, if enthusiastically cast the slim, silvery fish would often detach themselves and on a river bank bordering onto private house gardens the residents will often have found, mystifyingly, several Sprattus sprattus on their lawns and patios.

My enduring recollection and image of the Pike is having to sit astride a nine-pounder whilst my fellow teenage angler used the hinged gag and long discorger to remove the lure to allow the monster fish to be returned, unharmed but mightily disgruntled to its natural domain.

In that moment of restraining the pent up power of that fish I had felt as though I was astride a dolphin, a bit like the picture below but in my case, wearing a thick Parka coat, balaclava and walking boots.