They say that seniority is a degree, but this has not been the case this year on the banks of the Narcea to catch the campanu, the first salmon of the season. The young man Mauro Otero Roza, 17 years old, has taken the credit. And that, as he himself explains, this is his first season in the river and, specifically, this Tuesday, it was his third day with cane. “I had wanted to go salmon for years, but I couldn’t because I couldn’t find a partner. The river is new to me, not the sea, where I’ve been fishing since I was 4 years old,” he happily explained to LA NUEVA ESPAÑA hours after make history in the Narcea.
The young man, a native of Lastres but a resident of Lugones (Siero), landed very early this Tuesday a stupendous specimen of 4,475 kilos and 76 centimeters in Puente Laneo. “It didn’t give me much trouble, it took me four minutes,” he describes. In a few minutes he was at the nearby La Rodriga sealing center, where they certified his capture and received congratulations from the Salense mayor, Sergio Hidalgo, and councilor Ángeles Álvarez. “I don’t believe it, I’m very happy and at home too. As soon as I called, my father took the car and flew over to Cornellana.”
The campanu stung Mauro Otero as soon as he cast the rod, with shrimp bait. At half past seven he and his partner Rogelio Tomás, from El Entrego, stood in Puente Laneo. The minutes passed without much luck, they did not sting. So they both decided to go for a coffee. “When we got off the bridge, it occurred to us to try our luck from the shore,” explains Otero.
His partner tried first, the regulatory half hour. “As soon as he cast the rod, he felt something and when he lifted the shrimp the shrimp was no longer there. We became alert because when the hook comes out clean it is because it was a salmon that ate it.”
Rogelio Tomás tried again and at the end of his turn came that of his young partner. “I changed the color of the shrimp and as soon as I cast the rod, it bit and nailed it. It didn’t give a fight. It took four minutes,” describes Mauro Otero, for whom it was the last day he could fish until the weekend, since that this Wednesday he has to go back to class. The next course will go to the Nautical School of Gijón. “I love fishing and of course I love having caught the campanu. It was something I had never thought of,” he says.
This Wednesday, at six in the afternoon, he will have to return to Cornellana. Next to the monastery of San Salvador, the traditional campanu auction will be held, which this year belongs to Narcea, not Asturias, because the latter was already thrown to the ground on April 2, just the day the season opened, in the Seal.
The young man can pocket a good beak for his salmon, although he doesn’t lose sleep over it. “It’s the least of it, what they pay is secondary. Although nobody is bitter about a sweet, of course,” he says. The Campanu de Asturias traded in Cangas de Onís at 9,200 euros.
Mauro Otero’s is the first for Narcea and the second of the entire season, which after ten days is lacking in captures (Eo, Esva and Cares have not premiered) and has fans with the fly behind their ears. Everything indicates that as spring progresses, the fish will begin to bite. What does the fisherman think of the campanu? “Well, I don’t know, those who know about this say that they will start now, that each year the salmon enter later…”. Pure modesty. But on the banks of the Narcea seniority is not a degree.
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