One thing travelling extensively very clearly demonstrates is that despite the many differences fish have, no matter where in the world you fish, they share numerous similarities too. This goes for fresh water as well as the sea. Yet for most boat anglers, fishing in freshwater is akin to visiting another planet. There is an imagined barrier between the two beyond which most sea anglers are not prepared to stray. Such short sightedness is often based on limited information and possibly even a fear of trying the unknown. Forget people sat on tackle boxes along the banks of rivers, ponds and canals. Forget also fly anglers whipping the water for hours on end from the banks of high-density stocked holes in the ground. There are a number of fresh water boating opportunities which can be every bit as challenging and as wild as anything the sea has to offer, with fish potentially as big, as demanding, and as hard fighting. Some can even be approached with scaled down sea angling tactics. But most important of all, while large bodies of fresh water can also get dangerously rough at times, big lakes usually offer some boat fishing opportunities along a sheltered shoreline in all but the wildest weather conditions, which is more than can be said for many coastal venues.

CHAR

Most of the Cumbrian lakes & Scottish lochs were gouged out during the last ice age by glacial activity, which is why they are long, narrow, and often exceptionally deep. When the ice finally disappeared several thousand years ago, melt water filled the base of these valleys to form lakes. These were quickly invaded by fish including migratory arctic char, some of which eventually lost the urge to migrate back to the sea due to climatic change. As the waters warmed, char would not be able to survive in the shallower lakes where they died out. Only those lakes deep enough for thermal stratification where the sun warmed upper layers remain separate from the colder deeper layers due to water density differences were able maintain char populations. Char remain in 137 such lakes to this day. Lack of nutrients and food in the deeper parts of these lakes has unfortunately led to stunting. But the char are not restricted to the deeper areas all the time. During the winter the stratified water layers mix allowing fish access to the whole lake. And things remain like that until late spring when the upper layers start to warm again eventually pushing the fish back deep again.

Char are commercially caught on deep water trolling rigs involving outriggers, large weights, and up to a dozen spinners on droppers spaced out up the line. But in the spring, particularly on Windermere and Coniston, they move close in to the shore where they feed high up in the water. So high in fact that they can be caught on fly. A far more productive method however is slow trolling. Echo sounding has shown that most early season char prefer depths of 30 to 50 feet of water where they feed around 15 feet down from the surface. Tests have shown that rowing, or tick over trolling on a outboard using a light rod and a couple of drilled bullets on the line is enough to get a small spinner down into the feeding zone. It depends on the speed of the boat, and to an extent conditions on the day. It may be that an extra weight is required. It helps to start the day with different amounts of weight on the different rods until a pattern develops. Tiny Mepps or similar small spinners are ideal. Red and silver are always a good combination. Char are pretty determined fish when they see a potential meal, though it can take them several attempts before they are hooked. They also have a tendency to pull free on the way to the landing net. Otherwise, they are very easy fish to catch.

FEROX TROUT

In the deep cold waters of Britain's glacial lakes, the main predator of the char, and any other fish that happens to be knocking about, is the ferox trout. At the moment, ferox are classed as individual wild brown trout that have turned to fish feeding. Work is currently underway into the genetics of this fish with a view to establishing it as a species in its own right, which followed the char shoals into some of the more remote lakes of Britain and Scandinavia when they became ice free. Certainly there are differences between ferox and regular brown trout. Ferox appear to breed separately from ordinary brown trout, and switch to fish as their main source of protein at a very early age. This allows them to pile weight on rapidly. The current British record stands at well over 30 pounds, which is way beyond the growth potential of a regular brown trout feeding in the traditional manner on even the most productive Irish lime stone lough. Ferox live longer too and spawn on average only once every three years. Professor Andy Ferguson at Belfast University has already established some genetic differences between the two fish. Whatever the final outcome, these can be difficult but very exciting fish to catch.

Difficult is perhaps the wrong word to choose. Labour intensive would be a more appropriate description. Ferox numbers are not large, while the waters they live in often are. Their distribution nationally is also quite restricted, on top of which they could be feeding anywhere in the water column, all of which makes them very easy fish to miss. Many of the Scottish waters they frequent do not have public access. As a point of balance, all the English waters do. Ferox are caught regularly in Windermere, particularly by pike anglers. I have also seen them caught on Crummock Water where it is possible to hire boats to fish for them. Commercial char fishermen on Coniston pick up a few. Coniston is another water where boats can be launched and hired. The rest of the English lakes probably also have them, but getting at them becomes an increasing problem, though not to the point where it cannot be overcome. Probably the best known Scottish water is Loch Awe where boats can be launched and hired. Loch Awe has produced the last three ferox records, and it is known from survey work that even bigger fish are there to be caught. Some of the larger western Irish loughs such as Corrib, Conn and Mask also have ferox populations.

Trolling either deadbaits or large lures such as rapalas is the favoured method. Find the char shoals and you have the depth to set the trolling rigs at. Alternatively, particularly before the water starts to stratisfy, troll blind between mid water and the bottom over depths of 40 to 50 feet. Experiments have shown that for slow trolling, one ounce of lead should take a dead bait down to around 15 feet. Flat weights made from sheet lead are better than other shapes, not only because they offer less resistance, they also act as anti kink vanes to prevent line twist. Twist is not so much of a problem with rapalas, but with dead baits it can be. Ferox dead baits are rigged to give them an exaggerated rotating movement in the water by inserting 6 to 8 inches of paternoster wire down the centre of the bait and bending it like a banana. One treble hook then goes in the mouth, and a couple down each side held in place with a lashing of cotton thread. The only remaining ingredient is staying power. Members of ferox 85 who specialise in this type of fishing have recorded as many as 12 consecutive blanks. On the other side of the coin, fishing with them a few years ago we had three hits in the same day, boating two fish, both of which were well into double figures.

Trolling for ferox is exactly the same as fishing for pike other than in choice of water depth. So much so that some ferox specialists use wire traces because they expect to pick up pike along the way. Not all ferox water waters contain pike, but a lot do. Equally, there are lots of waters that don't contain ferox but have large populations of pike. Pike prefer depths of between 10 and 25 feet. The base of drop off's running parallel to the shore in 15 to 20 feet of water make especially good trolling lanes. The thing to be aware of with pike is the position of their eyes on top of the head. This favours a hunter that likes to strike its prey from below, so trolled dead baits or lures do not have to be tickling the bottom. Having them a few feet off is a good thing. Alternatively, double anchor the boat out in shallow water (10 to 15 feet) and spread static dead baits around the boat in all directions. These are best fished on a simple running leger rig with 12 to 18 inches of 20 lbs bs wire to a pair of trebles. Pike rigs can be bought at any good tackle shop. Deadbaits are initially secured with the two trebles then bound onto the rig with either elasticated thread or cotton.

The problem with pike baits in the areas I mainly fish is that recent legislation now bans the use of imported live and dead freshwater fish baits in lakes such as Windermere, Coniston, and much of the rest of the bigger lakes which contain rare species of fish such as char and schelly. The idea is to protect these fish from imported diseases. This however is not a major problem, as sea baits are every bit as good as, and on occasions superior to freshwater baits. Mackerel has an excellent reputation. Garfish, sprats and anchovies can be equally good. Ammo market a wide selection of sea baits for pike fishing. We were once on our way home from a big skate fishing trip at Oban when we decided to spend a couple of days en route at Loch Ken. Our mackerel supplies were almost down to zero, so I decided to try calamari squid fished static on a running leger, which was picked up by a pike of around 8 pounds. Another little used Ammo sea bait is launce. I have taken many good pike to double figures using them. One observation I have made is that even when the head and tail are removed to give a reasonable bait size, for some reason, like the perfect predator they are, pike still know to take them with what would have been the head end first.