352 PIKE AND OTHER COARSE FISH. 



NORFOLK BROAD AND RIVER FISHING. 



There can be no doubt that the Norfolk rivers with their 

 adjacent Broads present a greater extent of fishing ground for 

 coarse fish than any other district in England, and the average 

 sport enjoyed on them far exceeds that obtainable on other 

 waters. 



Putting the Broads, properly so called, on one side, there 

 are at least eighty miles of free fishing water, the takes in which 

 are not counted by the pound or by number, but by the stone. 

 Yet it is a curious fact that while sport of such a character is 

 enjoyed by the native angler and by those visitors who have 

 learned the ways of the natives, strangers coming down, how- 

 ever skilful anglers they may be, have but indifferent sport. 

 This is due chiefly to ignorance of the best places under different 

 conditions of wind, weather, and tide, and to the non-observance 

 of certain well-defined methods of fishing, which the depth of 

 water and strength of current render necessary. In all these 

 miles of free fishing the rivers present to the eye much the 

 same characteristics — broad, placid streams with marshy banks 

 and uniform currents— so that to one unacquainted with the 

 locality one spot looks as good as another. Yet this is not so. 

 The depth varies ; there is an imperceptible eddy in one part, 

 where the fish gather with the tide one way, and which they 

 may forsake when the tide flows the other way. The bottom 

 may in one spot be fairly clean, and ten yards away be very 

 foul. A knowledge of the contour of the river bottom is most 

 essential to successful angling, and this knowledge is not ob- 

 tainable without tne aid of local experience. The appearance 



