Fish & Fishers of the Lake District by Keith Harwood, £20

THE Lake District has inspired many a poet and writer but it has also provided a unique and beautiful setting for anglers.

Within its waters - its rivers, becks and lakes - are to be found a variety of fish, some rarely encountered elsewhere in the British Isles, like the charr, vendace and schelly which are relics of the last Ice Age.

Keith Harwood's book goes back in time to give a history of Lakeland angling and its anglers.

Few anglers visiting today are aware of the commercial fisheries and the hook-making for which it was once famous, or would realise that the places in which they fish might have been the favoured spots of three of the Lake District's best known literary figures - William Wordsworth, Arthur Ransome and Beatrix Potter.

The book is illustrated throughout with monochrome photographs and a colour plate section. It also includes an appendix giving a nineteenth century list of flies for the Lake District.

Lancashire-born Harwood regards himself as an all-round angler and has fished since the age of seven when his grandmother bought him his first rod and reel. His angling apprenticeship was served on local mill lodges and farmers' ponds. Nowadays, he fishes chiefly for trout and grayling on his local rivers: the Ribble, Hodder, Aire and Wharfe, with occasional forays after salmon, barbel and pike. His fishing has also taken him further afield - to Canada, Alaska and Norway. When he is not fishing he likes to dress flies, especially classic salmon flies, and he is an angling bibliophile with a large library of angling books.