Paul Arden | Tuesday, 11 November 2025
I’ve always found the “where are you from?” question to be a bit strange. Does it matter? Identity from a country is a residue of when humans were living in tribes. Common identity created the cohesive bonding in small tribes, that was necessary in order to survive. Similarly it leads to blind spots in thinking. Religion, flat-earthers, anti-vaxers, racists, political divides, football hooligans, fashion; it’s all the same root “I am one of these and so this is who I am”.
And humans are quite polarised in their thinking; you’re either in or out, one of us or not, a friend or a foe, my imaginary God is real while yours doesn’t exist. It’s a flaw in the human brain, that no doubt was required at some point in the history of our evolution. Or maybe we are just not very smart at processing information.
There should be no need to identify in a group. A far more interesting life is to live our own life, think for ourselves and be the person we want to be, not mould ourselves to fit into a group. The whole point of being in a group is not to be an individual. How dull!
And it’s bizarre when you think about it, that the feeling of identity that was necessary for small groups of early humans to bond in tribes, for hunting and survival purposes, nowadays results in war, genocide and most of the world’s problems, current and throughout history.
So the fishing has not been very good last week. Yesterday I had a good look around but didn’t find any sets of babies. I think we need rain. In fact we are due for the Wet Season and I’m ready for it! If we don’t get any soon I’ll have a campfire rain dance.
I did pick up one Snakehead that was moving territory. This is a very specific case that doesn’t happen very often. What happens is that the fish rises, and then about a minute later rises again, ten metres further on. And then, about a minute after this, another ten metres further on. It’s not a perfectly straight line, and I believe they swim at about ten feet below the surface; they are certainly not close to the surface. They can be in open water.
With these fish, if you can get a fly in front of them, then they will always eat. The challenge is the shot of course. You’re never totally sure the direction, but you should have an approximate location. And it’s usually a long cast, to give flexibility in case the fish changes direction.
It was an interesting fish too (today’s POD), quite light juvenile colours, and yet adult size, 2.5-3KG. That’s unusual. Also it was behaving like an adult and not like a juvenile.
The forecast looks wet. So maybe it’s all about to happen. Otherwise I will get the drums out.
Have a great week!
Cheers, Paul