Otter damaged pike from the archives

When the float sailed away on a gravel pit in mid-Norfolk a few seasons back, I found myself attached to a pike which gave up the ghost as soon as I whacked the hooks into it.

As it neared the net, I saw something I'd never seen before and haven't encountered since - the obvious aftermath of an otter attack.

I was fishing with a press photographer on a pit in the Wensum Valley, when I caught this double with fresh slash marks down both flanks.

Graham photographed the damage, as we debated the cause of the wounds on the fish. Fairly obvious, bearing in mind the river runs behind the spot we were fishing.

I nursed it in the margins before I let it go to take its chances.  I've seen otters or signs of otters on most waters I've fished over the last few winters.

But I've yet to see anything quite this graphic, regarding what happens when they bump into a pike.