The Young Angler's Secret

2024 Author: Sebastian Paterson | [email protected]. Last modified: 2023-12-16 13:47

Fishing tales

As soon as a pale yellow winter dawn dawned over the jagged wall of the forest on the eastern shore of the lake, a half dozen fishermen hurried to their cherished, or rather, catchy places. Vadim and I, my constant fishing companion, did not lag behind them. However, unlike most, we headed not towards the reeds, but towards the sand spit, near the stump, near which the pike invariably pecked in the summer.

Vadim and I settled down not far from each other. Having drilled the first hole, he lowered the tackle with live bait into it and continued to drill new holes. He managed to drill two more, as a bite followed, and a kilogram pike soon fluttered on the ice. Another fifteen minutes passed, and I was lucky: a pike of eight hundred grams was coveted on the spinner. Vadim immediately fished out another pike.

- Well, thank God, it's off! - he exclaimed with delight. And how he jinxed …

An hour, another - not a single bite. Towards noon, a boy of about twelve came down to us from a small village on a steep bank. In his hands he carried an ice pick and a foam fishing rod - a filly. First, he asked about our catch. And when he saw our three pikes, he grunted disapprovingly: "Frankly, not a lot."

And not paying more attention to us, he first carefully examined the ice around, then moved twenty meters closer to the shore and settled there. Having pounded the paw hole, he did not even begin to clear it of sludge, but immediately moved to another place. “Probably hit the snag,” I thought involuntarily, watching his movements.

The boy, meanwhile, has drilled three more holes in different places. Then he returned to the first. Having cleared her of broken ice, he lay down, looked at her for several minutes, after which, hiding behind the sleeve of his jacket, he began to flash. You could see how he rhythmically wiggled the tip of the fishing rod, giving the spoon the necessary vibrations. Then he suddenly froze. “Apparently, he discovered something interesting and is now afraid to frighten,” I suggested.

But unexpectedly, a young angler hooked up, knelt down and dragged the pike onto the ice. It would seem: here it is - a happy hole: catch and catch! Enjoy your moment of luck. Imagine my surprise when the boy, after catching the fish, immediately left the lucky hole and moved on to the second. There everything was exactly the same: again he lay down on the ice, carefully looking out for something in the greenish-gloomy water column for a long time.

But he never put the tackle in the water, but went to the third hole. There, after a short inspection of the hole, he began to flash. And after a few minutes he pulled out a pike. On this he ended up fishing. Hooking the pikes on the tee of the spinner, the boy went to the shore.

- What were you doing there over the hole? - asked Vadim when the lucky fisherman passed by.

- Yes, a very cunning pike has become now - you look into the hole and see how the fish comes to the spoon, knocks around it, but does not take it. Throw it right under her nose, it won't take it. But I am also cunning and therefore, unlike you, I do not wait for the pike to grab the spinner, but choose a convenient moment and hook it with the hooks of the tee.

- Do you miss often? - I asked curiously.

- Of course, there are mistakes, but I got the hang of it and, as you can see, I won't be left without a catch, - finished the boy.

“So much for the deafness, - I thought, looking after the boy who was leaving with the prey, - knowledge of the reservoir, and certain skills make fishing very prey even in this seemingly bezleless time”.