Hooked on fishing: Old English method fills day at the pond

We call these pinkies. They are the maggots of the housefly. Big ones like this are gozzers. They come from bluebottles or blowflies." George Western selected a fat red maggot from a container full of bran and wriggling maggots, then carefully impaled it on a tiny hook and cast it out into the dark water.

The slim float bobbed gently near dark green waterlily pads. Cows grazed on the other side of the pond, which lies in a basin in gentle hill country about an hour's drive from downtown Auckland.

Western watched his float intently. "See those bubbles. That means tench are feeding on the bottom," he said as he wound in the fragile 1kg line. "We'll catch a tench now."

He expertly threaded half a worm onto his size 20 hook. "The tail section is better than the whole worm," Western added, casting the 4m rod with a practised flick.

Half a minute later the slim float slid under the surface. Raising his rod smoothly, the fisherman spun his reel to tighten the line then carefully led the writhing fish into the shallows, picked up a large-mouthed net on a long handle and leaned over to scoop up his prize.

"Look at that. A lovely tench," he said, cradling the dark green fish in a gnarled hand while he deftly poked a thin instrument into its mouth with a surgeon's skill and flicked out the hook. The tench was slipped into the wide maw of a fine-meshed keep-net to join dozens of golden rudd and other tench which would be put back in the pond at the end of the day's sport.

Western is one of hundreds of coarse-fishing enthusiasts who belong to six clubs in Auckland, Lower Hutt and Christchurch. Like him, many brought with them from England their love of this delicate, specialised form of fishing. The tradition dates back centuries.

He raises maggots for bait, adding dye imported from England to their food to colour them red or bronze.

"Some days white maggots are best, and other days coloured ones work well - or we use a combination.

"I keep my own flies in a special cage with a lamp to keep the temperature at about 23 degrees. When they first hatch I give them sugar water for a couple of days, then put in a piece of liver. That stimulates their hormones and encourages them to breed."

The liver is replaced with a fresh piece the next day, and another on the third day.

"I let them blow it, and it takes two days for the eggs to hatch. 1 feed the maggots on ox heart, fish or boiler chickens and they grow for four days before changing into a chrysalis. We call them casters, and they are good bait on their own."

It is a continuous cycle, producing fresh maggots for Western's weekly fishing trips. As well as rudd and tench, he catches perch, koi carp, catfish, and common goldfish.

"I hold the New Zealand record for perch [4lb 7oz, these fishermen still talk in pre-metric terms]," said Western, slotting a handful of breadcrumbs, maggots and golden kernels of canned corn into the pouch of a shanghai and firing it out into the pond.

"Keep giving the fish groundbait but don't overfeed them," he cautioned.

"I was playing a three-and-a-half pound perch the other day, and another huge perch tried to eat it. That fish must have been 12 or 13 pounds.

"You have to be careful with perch. They have blood vessels near the skin in the throat, and if they are deeply hooked they will die. But they have white meat and are very good to eat ... better than trout."