Dressed in their finest tweeds and vintage waders, 14 men and women pose for a photograph. Behind them, the glorious river Alness. You could be forgiven for thinking this was a shoot, apart from one critical detail: the lady taking the pictures (me) had not been threatened with a lawsuit should any of them find their way to the internet.
The beaming faces showed no sign of societal discomfort because ours was not a pheasant shoot but a wild salmon fishing gathering in Scotland. Everything else – the luxurious Anta decorated lodge, the fleet of four by fours, the candelabra-lit dinners and the endless discussions about kit/weather/yield – was exactly the same.
I uploaded my snaps to social media knowing I was joining a club that is at once the most and least exclusive in the world, its popularity having grown exponentially since 2020.
The fundamental difference between fishing and shooting, says David Profumo, author of The Lightning Thread, is that ‘with shooting it’s a matter of life and death.’ Shooting is often referred to in the press as ‘hunting’, making it even less likely to appear on an influencer’s feed. Fishing is about skill, and mostly the fish win, he explains. It’s also a broach church. ‘I’ve fished with a duke and a dustman and from my local river to Mexico, Tahiti, New Zealand and the Seychelles,’ says Profumo, whose house in Perthshire has a dedicated room just for tackle.
Ok… I doubt the Houghton Club (with all of 25 members, including King Charles III) which is harder to get nominated for than the Oscars, will be inviting me to join after just one go. But it's a happy thing that no one runs for their life when an amateur pics up a rod. Women, many argue, make better fishers than men. In fact, Ashley Mullenger, known as ‘the female fisherman’ on Instagram, just won the prestigious fishing title this year.
It is also hailed as the ultimate lesson in mindfulness; so restorative to both mind and body that Mary Gibson now offers fishing days with two charities, Cancer and Pisces Trust and Maggie’s Cancer Care Charity.
Much of fishing is now ‘catch and release’ (meaning the fish are let go, mostly unharmed), making it Gen Z friendly. Devotees include our late Queen and current King, Emma Watson, David Beckham and Prue Leith. Like heli-skiing, it offers no end of complicated and exotic travel opportunities. ‘Chasing a huge Norwegian Atlantic Salmon in Norway comes to mind,’ says fish connoisseur and former ad executive, Angus Fowler. ‘Also, the shy but terrifyingly strong Milkfish in the Seychelles; Heli-fishing for wild trout in New Zealand; Turbo charged Tarpon anywhere and the legendary Masheer in India.’
Many great writers, from Ernest Hemingway to poet Ted Hughes, were fish enthusiasts. ‘Fly fishing is solitary, contemplative, misanthropic, scientific in some hands, poetic in others, and laced with aesthetic considerations,’ writes John Gierach. ‘It’s not even clear if catching fish is actually the point.’ Even Brad Pitt played his part: the film, A River Runs Through It in which he starred, elevated fishing from niche to plain cult in 1992.
It’s not about booming Die WalkÜre from the loud speakers. It’s the opposite. Fowler fishes in places so exclusive that they can’t be mentioned by name. ‘It’s difficult to even refer to them,’ he says, mysteriously. ‘If I’m asked where I go, I just name another river in the general area and am vague about the time. Like, “oh it’s a little river, on the east coast, near the Brora.”’
And if you can mention a river at all it’s because you paid dearly to fish there. Top of the heap in the UK would be fishing on the Test (for non-farmed trout). Corporate days are popular with bankers and hedge funds (largely because gillies literally fill the water with farmed trout shortly beforehand so the CEO can bray).
One-upmanship is all part of the fun. ‘I’ve been fishing in Balmoral’ is nothing compared to doing it in Iceland (where David Beckham and Gordon Ramsay stay in billionaire-owned lodges that come with Cordon Bleu chefs), or Cuba or Alaska or New Zealand.
Where there’s a sport, there’s adventure. Marina Gibson, fishing guru to the great and the good, is about to take a group of men to the Seychelles. The trip involves two small planes (after the big ones). ‘This is bootcamp,’ she says. ‘We are fishing for giant Trevally [bird-eating fish]. Also for bonefish, bumphead parrot fish, triggerfish, permit – all on the fly rod.’ In layman’s terms, this means chasing airborne fish. Such adventure does not come cheap. A week will set you back a cool $12.5k.
Gijs Sijpesteijn. founding partner of SteynWaters, which organises bespoke sporting trips around the world, argues that we should all take up fly fishing because of its mental benefits. ‘It is all about patience, thinking about your quarry’s elements, the art of the cast and ultimately humanity, whether you eat your quarry or release it back in the river. You also have to consider the natural elements. Do they work for you or against you?’
Where shooting is about quantity, ‘with fishing I’ve gone for days and caught nothing or come back with 246 salmon (from 12 rods) on the East Anga River,’ says Sijpesteijn. ‘At the end of the day the fish has the choice to take the bait or ignore it.’
The possibility of the ‘bite’ is what keeps many standing in cold water until the early hours of the morning, says Fowler. ‘A true fisherman will answer “not yet” to the question of whether they have caught anything, no matter how long it has been since they last caught something,’ he says.
It takes much longer to get the dopamine hit, in other words, making the addiction almost incurable.
