Too many people measure their enjoyment of fishing by the number of dead carcases they drag home to their pots and stoves. For others it becomes a money making game, where each shad they poach or take equals R 20....hey nooit, lahnee, I don't walk away from cash, ekse!!
There is a different dimension to fishing that many people just don't get - the simple pleasure of being outdoors, of seeing things the couch potato doesn't see, of seeing whales, sardines, dolphins, sunsets, sunrises. There is the further pleasure of companionship, of shared interests, of camaraderie and helping your buddy land a good fish or occasionally landing one yourself. THere is the bullshit around the braai, the planning and scheming to outwit the fish, and the pleasure of doing things well. All of these things can be enjoyed for their own, you need not necessarily land a fish to make the exercise worthwhile. I can go to North Pier and sit there for hours catching one blacktail after another, mightily pissing off the "subsistence" anglers, and go home without a fish and still feel satisfied, or walk the banks in Durban bay fishing for mullet, releasing them and going home happy, or use a fly rod for springer and kingies without ever feeling I have to justify the cost of my tackle, ot that I have failed when I didn't land a fish.
Even sitting at Inanda dam in the quiet hours of the evening, watching your motionless plicemen on your carp rods brings a very special kind of peace and contentment. If you do manage to land a fish, so much the better.
To qoute a famous saying....Men go fishing all their lives, without realising that it isn;t the fish they're after.
