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I don't know about you but I love a new challenge…

...and until recently I was wondering why. My philosophy towards my fishing is that variety is the spice

of life and by fishing a variety of venues I satisfy myself and I keep

enjoying my fishing. I see so many anglers get disillusioned with the game

and it's usually anglers that fish the same venue's week in week out. I

think these anglers stop learning and it's the learning that keeps us

interested and hungry for more.

I think that it's important that we never stop learning in our fishing and

it's who we learn from that I think is especially important. Quite often

I've seen match anglers walk straight past a pleasure angler who is catching

a fish a chuck without even acknowledging them - do we put ourselves on such

a pedestal that we can't talk to someone just because they don't have the

latest kit? Pleasure anglers have provided me with so many gems of

information over the years and even if the angler concerned doesn't

understand what is happening its still good to get their take on events. One

such occasion was during a walk along the River Trent; there was an angler

catching loads of roach close in on hempseed, he was feeding heavily and he

began to tell me how he fished the area most days and always got frustrated

with barbel muscling in and ruining his roach sport. "I must hook three or

four a day" he said. This was music to my ears and next time I drew the

stretch in a match I had four barbel all on the same short line he was

feeding and all by feeding lots of hempseed.

It's all very well learning from other anglers but quite often top anglers

have also had a huge help along the way from other top anglers and there are

so many matchmen who have reached the top of the sport after being guided

along the way, usually by an older angler. I first started fishing because my

dad was a keen match angler, he would win a few matches on natural venues

and usually with bream but as soon as commercial fisheries took off and I

started to fish a different circuit I became good friends with Sean Huggins.

Sean is a very good commercial fishery angler and taught me so much, as one

of the best anglers in the area I was very fortunate to live near him and

also for him to take me along to matches on different fisheries. He would

show me rigs and how to feed in his own aggressive style and as I got a bit

better we'd start to bounce ideas of each other - it makes me wonder how

many young anglers have the natural ability but are lacking the guidance and

nurturing of an older wiser head.