Hazel Joe...Freedom

[Traditionalist]

There was nothing that Joe could not catch if he wanted to, but he was useless with a fly-fishing rod.  I took him fishing a couple of times, but he was not really interested. After the first couple of trips, he came along a few times, but generally disappeared after a fairly short while, and then turned up just before it was time to leave. My diaries note a total of nine fishing trips with a rod.

"Done any good lad?"  He asked, as he turned up on one of these occasions. "Not bad", I replied, holding up my creel for inspection. It contained seven nice fish, one really good one about two and a half pounds, a really excellent fish for a small beck. Indeed, for many it would have been the fish of a lifetime from such a beck.

Taking a sack from inside his jacket, he tipped it on the ground, he had a whole mass of eels, and several nice trout! Some of the eels were really large. I didn?t count them, but there were certainly a couple of dozen. All neatly cleaned and ready for cooking. He had tickled most of the trout, no mean feat on a beck he did not know, and he had caught the eels using "eel sticks". 

"Eel sticks" are simply pliant sticks, preferably hazel or similar, about a yard long, cut from convenient bushes. These are sharpened at one end, a piece of nylon line tied to the tip, and a hook on the other end. These are then baited with worms, and the sticks are rammed into the bank at whatever appears to be good places.  The eels, and occasionally other fish, take the worms, are hooked, and because the sticks are so whippy, they are unable to get off the hook. Much the same principle as a fishing rod.

One simply has to come along and haul them in.  Worms are "dibbled up" with a "Dibble stick". This is a stout branch, preferably with a fork at the top, similar to the type one would use for a catapult, but longer, also cut from a bush or tree. This is also sharpened, and the sharp end is pushed into the ground and "dibbled". This means moving the stick around, or tapping the forked end in such a way, that the worms think,( as far as worms are capable of thinking, presumably the behaviour is a survival instinct), that a mole is coming, and they shoot out of their burrows, and can be picked up.  Some people can dibble very well, others are not so good at it. Hazel Joe was an expert of course. He could fill a jar with worms very quickly.  I am pretty good at it myself, and the first time I show new anglers the trick they are always impressed. My next door neighbour could do it almost immediately, after being shown once, and has never dug a worm since.

Before leaving, Joe and I sat for a while on the bank near a waterfall, drinking tea, and just watching the water.  Turning to Joe, I asked him why he was not much interested in fishing with a rod. "It?s interesting enough lad", he said, "It?s nice to see you do it and enjoy it so much, but there?s better and easier ways".  "Oh I know that", I replied, "But I thought you might like it, especially as you dress flies so well, and always seem to know where the fish are, and things like that". He sat and thought for a while, and then he said, "We see things differently lad", he said, "tha mainly wants the fishin? and ah just mainly wants the fish".

He was right of course.  I wanted the fish as well, but not in the same way.

Fly-dressing for Joe was mainly a means of obtaining income. Some of his "secret" patterns were only used with his otter, and he never sold them, but he sold many others. His flies were held in very high regard, and commanded a good price. One or two shops bought flies from him, and he also got his hooks and nylon in trade. He did not need anything else. Materials he used were the finest obtainable. His feathers and skins were of the very finest quality to start with, and he only used the very best of these for dressing flies.  Nowadays, all sorts of stuff is offered for fly-dressing, the skins of animals and birds which have been obtained in one way or another, but often completely without regard for their suitability.  Female starlings caught in summer for instance, can be used for some things, but really killing spider flies and similar patterns, have to be dressed using the hackles from an old  cock starling, killed when the plumage is at its finest. Many birds reach their peak of plumage in springtime, shortly before mating, and many fur bearing animals are best in winter. If one wishes to obtain the best materials, one must know these times.

For some patterns, the feathers from young birds are required, preferably from the first feathering. These are unobtainable nowadays as a rule, as there is nobody who knows how or where to obtain them. There are a great many things which can not be bought in the quality which is required. One may tie flies with all sorts of things, and even badly tied flies, using lousy materials will catch fish. Better tied flies with good materials will catch a lot more though. "Better tied", does not mean the "perfect" standard flies that many professionals tie, or that win "tying competitions", for many patterns, a certain "studied scruffiness" is far more effective.

Feathers and furs from various animals and birds also vary very considerably, depending not only on the age of the animal, and the time of year, but on the basic colouration and diet of the animal in question. Joe chose only the finest for fly-dressing. The variations in quality, as it applies to materials used for fly-dressing, are quite massive, and only somebody who has handled the finest and seen the difference in the flies tied from it, and those tied with second rate stuff, can see the difference.

Joe used a great variety of materials, skins from rabbits, hares, squirrels, shrews, rats, various types of mice, weasel stoat, hedgehog, mole, and a few others.  Some of these were very carefully treated in various ways, some tanned, some dyed using old natural dye recipes. They were beautiful to see and to handle. Joe never bought any materials, except silk, and hooks. His collection of bird skins was a real eye-opener. He had dozens of perfectly prepared skins in large flat boxes. Between the skins he had crysanthemum and mint leaves, in order to repel moths and other pests. It seemed to work alright, he never had any pests in his stuff.

Dry-flies were of no interest to him. He tied only wet flies. Dry flies will not work with an otter, they are simply pulled under. They will work with a so-called "dumper", officially referred to as a "fixed engine", ( and illegal in most places), which is basically a line tied to a stake on one side of a pool.  The line is manipulated from the other side, making the flies "dance" on the water, but Joe did not use this method much at all. He only used it once in my company, and it was not particularly successful in any case.

He actually mostly used a variation of the method, involving a large cork float with an "antenna" of hazel, to which the line was attached. This is thrown out, and the flies made to dance on the surface, by jiggling the line. It is diffcult to do well, very difficult on running water,  and has a number of drawbacks.  If necessary it will work using wet flies anyway, so there is no need to use "dry" flies.  Quite a lot of small fish are also caught using this method, which is often immaterial to a person using such methods of course, a fish is a fish. For somebody who fishes to eat, the size of the fish caught is really secondary, although usually reasonably sized ones are preferred, simply because they are easier to prepare.

Hazel Joe showed me a number of ways to prepare fish and small game in the field.  We invariably did this at the caravan of course. One can not go around the countryside lighting fires in order to cook illegally obtained game! Salt was about the only thing he bought. All his other herbs and spices he obtained himself, and he had a very large collection.  I wish now that I had paid a lot more attention to some of the plants and roots he used, but this was often difficult as they were usually shredded or ground when he used them, and I only went along a couple of times when he gathered plants. We once spent the best part of a morning gathering wild garlic in the local woods. He was very particular at this. The various parts of the plant were carefully sorted, and placed in various sacks. These were sorted again at the caravan, and then treated in various ways. Some stuff was hung up to dry, other things were placed in glass jars, some stuff was dried in his earth oven, or smoked over a fire, and others again were put in small containers, and covered over with liquid fat, which solidified on cooling.

Much game is not very fat at all, and Joe used a lot of bacon fat which he rendered himself in an iron pot, for cooking. Some of the stuff he made was absolutely delicious, and I was occasionally invited.  It was not always prudent to ask about the ingredients of some meals. His "Blood soup" which was made from the blood of hares or rabbits, was something I just could not stomach. It looked and smelled alright, but my knowledge of its origin prevented me from trying it. His diet was obviously very healthy, as he was never ill, not even with a cold. This probably also had to do with the fact that he very rarely came into contact with other people.  He very rarely washed. Even when his hands were absolutely filthy or covered in blood, he would just wipe them off on the grass, and quite cheerfully eat a sandwich or a piece of meat. It never seemed to do him any harm.  I was exceedingly careful in this regard, my immune system was probably not half as hardy as his, and so I only ate stuff which had been freshly cooked, or plants, etc, which had been washed in fresh running water.

Fresh water was a problem where he lived, and he had a rather ingenious system for catching and filtering rain water. The surface of his tin sheeting was always kept clean, and he brushed it off regularly with a large twig broom.  He probably got fairly large doses of dissolved zinc and iron from this, but it also apparently did him no harm. He had two large oil-drums standing next to each other. One on a stand of bricks, so that it was a fair bit higher than the other.  They were both covered, and the first one, where the water ran in, was filled with clean gravel, the other one, half full of sand.  There was a pipe between the bottom of the two drums, and in the sand barrel, clean water welled up above the sand. When the gravel barrel was full, he simply diverted the water. Occasionally he added a handful of something to the gravel barrel, but I don?t know what it was. Perhaps some natural antibiotic, or similar? Another of the things I never found out. This water was used for cooking, making tea, and occasionally for making up dyes and similar things. He did not use it for washing.

Once, we were sitting drinking tea in the caravan, and it was raining very heavily. The large drops hammering on the tin sheeting made a very loud noise, and it was impossible to talk because of it, but there was a sudden lull, as the rain stopped momentarily, and for some reason I was moved to ask him a question. I put my mug down, and said "When were you born Joe?".  He looked at me for a moment, his brow furrowed, his eyes took on the "faraway" look, I had come to know, and then he said "In winter Lad", got up and went outside to see to his ferrets.  I never asked him again.

It may seem odd to many, but we did not talk very much at all, and certainly not about personal things. We knew very little about each other really.  We got on very well together, and after a while I was able to assist him without having to be instructed in detail, although he never bothered giving much detail anyway, and we were content with each other?s company, and whatever pursuit we were currently engaged in. We were friends, but not the type of friends who pour out their problems or worries to each other. We just enjoyed being together.

Joe was a free spirit, he did as he pleased, when he pleased, he had few frustrations. His only responsibility was to his animals.  Sometimes now, I look at my house, my small business, the people who work for me, the lack of time I have for all the things I would like to do, the things I am forced to do in order to continue this existence, and it often seems like a crushing burden. At such times I am intensely envious of his way of life. Joe was content, and he was free.  His life was not easy, and he had to work to feed himself and his animals, but it never seemed like work, and only took a relatively small part of his time in any case. His skills and knowledge were such, that he had no trouble at all obtaining the things he needed or wanted. He did not need or want very much in any case. I have heard it said on a number of occasions that hunters and gatherers were obliged to spend large amounts of their time simply obtaining food.  I do not believe it.  It seems reasonable to assume that such people would be competent, and the only things that would cause them any real difficulty would be natural catastrophes, like fire, drought, or lack of game, or perhaps physical infirmity. Now, many years later, I have read numbers of books on primitive cultures, some of them from learned anthropologists among others. I am certain that had they seen Joe in action, they would have revised some of their theories.

Joe was not only in his element, he was a part of it, in a way that many nowadays are completely incapable of understanding. Even those among us who angle or hunt for pleasure, or even partial sustenance, can not fully realise the attitude of somebody who is more or less wholly dependent on it for his existence. Often, I wonder why Joe had so much patience with me at the beginning.  I would like to think he saw a kindred spirit, but I don?t really know why he went to the trouble of showing me so many things. Perhaps he needed to feel that somebody cared, or that some of his skill and knowledge would be passed on. Again, I do not know. I was not given much to philosophising at the time, and I did not question something which gave me so much pleasure.

Joe?s teaching certainly made me a much better fisherman, and also gave me a keen appreciation of many other things which I would otherwise never have experienced. It also had some less fortunate side effects, although this depends largely on one?s point of view of course. It made me an outsider, with unusual interests. It made me extremely reluctant to accept authority. My attitude to animals and fish was, and is, completely different to many other people?s. This was not only due to Joe of course, my youth was also formed by relative poverty and hardship. I often wonder what I would have done, or been able to achieve if I had "put my mind to it" at an earlier age. Assuming I had had the chance. Who knows?

There is a great deal for which I have Joe to thank, and I am not too unhappy at the outcome. I am often restless and discontent, and alleviate this by going fishing usually, or for long solitary walks, and this is certainly partly a result of my association with Joe. It certainly taught me to appreciate freedom. Often I sit and wonder what Joe would have thought of today?s hectic world, which even then was beginning to make existences like his more or less impossible.  I greatly fear that his answers would not be at all satisfactory. Some of my own answers are not even satisfactory to me.

I sit occasionally, and look at the few flies I have left, of those which we tied together, or at the dried out partridge skin, or the mole pelt, both of which are over thirty years old now, and my mind takes me back to other days. The words of a great poem echo often through my head at such times,

"Oft, in the stilly night, ere slumbers chain has bound me, fond memory, brings the light of other days around me".

I don?t know who wrote it, and can not credit the original author here. For those interested, here is the poem as I recall it,

Oft in the stilly night
Ere slumber's chain has bound me,
Fond Mem'ry brings the light
Of other days around me:
The smiles, the tears of boyhood's years,
The words of love then spoken;
The eyes that shone,
Now dimm'd and gone,
The cheerful hearts now broken!
Thus in the stilly night
Ere slumber's chain has bound me,
Sad Mem'ry brings the light
Of other days around me.

When I remember all
The friends, so link'd together,
I've seen around me fall
Like leaves in wintry weather,
I feel like one
Who treads alone
Some banquet-hall deserted,
Whose lights are fled,
Whose garlands dead,
And all but he departed!
Thus in the stilly night
Ere slumber's chain has bound me,
Sad Mem'ry brings the light
Of other days around me.

TL
MC