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Things that go bump in the night

Chris Cheshire

Chris Cheshire

Senior Member
After the sun goes down and the bats have woken up, when the sounds of passers by and traffic have faded out and the sounds of the night have settled in - I find myself, as I'm sure you do listening for evidence of fish moving.

There's the thrash of a predator ploughing into unsuspecting fry
There's the flick and roll of the bream
The 'putishhh.... splosh' of salmon momentarily leaving the confines of the river before belly flopping back like my uncle Cedric does on holiday
Then of course there is the measured roll/swirl of the barbel that I have come to recognise, all be it rather less frequently than I would like.

Over the last few nights I have been witness to something quite different and I'm wondering if any of you guys have experienced anything similar...

The noise i have been hearing is hard to explain, but sort of sounds initially like that of a big like attacking followed by a series of around 4 or 5 rolls with no gap between. The whole thing lasts around 10 seconds and appears to be made by something of significant size.

Has anyone else experienced this ??
 
Through the afternoon there have been some big salmon leaping. As I prepped for midnight last night I heard something like a fish being played and brought to the top...there is no one above me so I ploughed through the nettles to see if I could see something but by the time I got through all I saw was ripples. I can only put it down to two things.....catfish or otters......the latter usually stay on top after a kill.
 
Hi Jeff

I considered the catfish, but I feel it was doubtful as at one point there were two happening simultaneously - one upstream and one 30 yards downstream - much as I don't doubt their presence I don't honestly believe they are around in those numbers. I discounted salmon as they appeappeared siderably bigger than the salmon that were leaping.

I feel they were possibly too frequent for otters...
 
Alex I would have thought that myself but otters don't eat under water. As for seals graham I disagree, again they tend to eat on top.
It would be nice to have someone with a bit of knowledge on this for a good perspective.
 
Awfully sorry "Jeffrey"

I understood Chris wanted some suggestions of what "it" might be.

Day 2 Jeffrey. Good start.
 
Chris I am assuming you are fishing the Lower Severn? If so I would not discount cats, not the feline type though.

However two weeks ago I walked a part of the Avon Valley Nafford to be exact, I encountered a large male fox just yards from me in broad daylight , and later what I thought was Red Deer in the Nature Reserve. However the most fascinating encounter was a species with two legs, and a camera, a very keen photographer head to toe in Realtree.

We chatted and he wanted to 'shoot' an Otter, as he had never seen one, I told him I have spotted Otter just yards from where we were stood, perhaps it is because the Angler sits for hours and is better placed to see an Otter?

However he mentioned that he had a strange recent encounter with what he described as a Large Black Cat, he insisted it was too big to be a domestic cat, he glimpsed it briefly, thinking it was a Labrador, but it was cat like,, with a cat like lope.

He saw the 'thing' at Pixham, the Barbel Society stretch, I have spent many an hour staring at this bank, from the opposite side, and I have never seen a large cat, I have seen plenty of Fox, The occasional floppy hat, and of course plenty of SHEEP!!! :eek:

Go careful, we don't really know what lurks in the dark!!
 
Strange you should say that Neil, at the end of last season, whilst fishing the opposite bank to Pixham, one of the guys fishing at the Pixham stretch found a sheep's hoof, freshly separated from the rest of the animal......

Odd indeed!
 
I guess there is the slim possibility Neil that it was cats spawning ??
I was fishing a relatively shallow area for the lower, so if there are a quantity of them around I guess it could of been?

Do find it hard to believe tho...
 
John Care said:
Strange you should say that Neil, at the end of last season, whilst fishing the opposite bank to Pixham, one of the guys fishing at the Pixham stretch found a sheep's hoof, freshly separated from the rest of the animal......

Odd indeed!
Click to expand...

Seen similar John at Nafford, a Deer's hoof that was detached hoof the leg, probably just Fox, but what on Earth brought down a Deer?
 
Chris Cheshire said:
I guess there is the slim possibility Neil that it was cats spawning ??
I was fishing a relatively shallow area for the lower, so if there are a quantity of them around I guess it could of been?

Do find it hard to believe tho...
Click to expand...

Well yes could be Chris, I have sighted a a catfish by 'your' bit, it 'porpoised' out of the water, but didn't make a sound,.

Perhaps the most startling was at Severn Stoke when in a bush alongside me actually 'erupted' into a loud crashing noise and then a huge splash into the water, not at all stealth Otter like.
 
In my opinion it's best not to over think these things, sound and sight is very distorted in the dark. Add in the paranoia, exposure and exhaustion and weird things happen. I've heard some crazy stories from night shift workers.
It's incredible how loud a kingfisher is splashing in. Otters make a right racket when they are playing. They also seem to be chasing waterfowl more and I suspect a duck being chased by an otter would be pretty loud.
Unless you get a visual ID it's almost impossible and even then not guaranteed. Look at that "crocodile" in the Thames, turned out to be a bit of rope.
https://www.google.co.uk/amp/s/www....ver-thames-but-have-we-all-been-roped-in/amp/
 
Muntjac and Roe Deer , are keen if noisy swimmers . I have seen them swimming across the Yorkshire Ouse and Nidd on several occasions , usually crossing to consume a tasty crop in a farmers field , I am advised that they are particularly partial to sweetcorn , tasty .....:) Seal is another distinct possibility
 
Pixham Farm, Pixham Ferry and Clevelode have stories of a large black cat, we had a sheep killed last year and what ever killed it ripped its throat out and its inards in one night, whilst we were fishing.....it left a trail of stuff as it dragged the fulley grown Ewe about ...
 
Fantastic.... cheers Lawrence so now it's not just the rats I have to be concerned about, it's also the alligators and the big cats....

I'm gonna give up fishing and take up a safer hobby, like basejumping.
 
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