The latest series of film reports by Trevor Philpott
Any real fisherman will cheerfully confess he is mad. His fishing will come before his home, his wife, his job, even his health. He'll sit through gale and rain, through the nights as well as through the days, often angling for fish that he knows will be far too small and far too muddy ever to be fit for eating.
Yet two-and-a-half million Britons go fishing, far more than take part in any other sport. Some pay £1,000 a season for a trout stream, some bet hundreds of pounds on their chances of winning a big competition. Can they all really be mad? The File on The Fisherman tries to find out.