Once again I have been scouring the land on river recces and any succour I have taken from the diminution in traffic now that fuel is the price of malt whisky has been offset by the ferocity of the heatwave.

I haven’t been able to get 1976 out of my mind and the blistering summer that some of you will remember. Our legendary environmentalist Sir Peter Scott gave a lecture that year at the UEA and it was pretty much the first time any of us had considered the term global warming. I not only attended but found myself in the gents with the great man afterwards, an occasion made memorable by the fact he told me East Anglia would be as dry as the Sahara by the turn of the century. His timing might have been out but perhaps not the sentiment?

Whatever, the rivers I have visited have been crying out for rain that steadfastly refuses to fall. One of my briefs is to take photographs for the production team who commission me, but do not fully understand the subtleties of running water. So, in order, I have clicked away on the Wye, the Hampshire Avon, the Test and the Wensum. What a line-up. You and I as anglers know that we are talking perhaps the four most iconic rivers in England and Wales and that each is quite unique in character.

The Wye is a mighty borderland river that depends on mountain run-off for its vigour. The Avon is a muscular chalk stream of dramatic power whilst the Test is in many ways a smaller, less bullish version. And then we have the Wensum...a chalk stream again in name, but struggling in nature as the heat burns on and on.

My job as always was to capture both the beauty and the “fishability” of our Top Four. The beauty of all is not in question and in each case a quite differing loveliness shone through. The Wye is a grandly rolling river, even in low conditions, and reflects the ruggedness of its environs. On my patch, the Black Mountains stood sentinel and imbued the scene with mystery and foreboding. The Test is all chocolate box Britain, quaintly straddled by ancient bridges and dotted with clusters of thatch-topped cottages. The Avon, certainly where I took out my camera, ran through an England that Constable would have recognised, all hay meadows, towering willows and glimpses of church steeples down the sleepy valley. And, ah, the Wensum? Chances are you know it well, perhaps even where it is at its most special, up at Bintry where the Seaman family have created a paradise all these years.

So, then, all of the Famous Four are stunners in looks but where would you most want to take out your rod this burnished summer? Being totally dispassionate, I’d have to place the Hampshire Avon at the top of this exalted list. The clarity of the water, the luxuriance of the weed , the curling power of the current and the sheer profusion of quality fish of eight species make this river every angler’s Mecca.

Next, I’d place the Wye. Whilst the well-publicised scandal of chicken farm effluent has wrecked this river’s clarity and weed growth, there are still huge numbers of trout, chub and barbel, along with perch to make you drool. Interestingly, I’d place the Test third , not because it lacks in number of fish but because the majority of them are not wild but stocked. There is a limit to how long you are happy catching either small wild trout or jumbo trout as smart as Dumbo. That leaves us the Wensum , my favourite river of course, propping up the list. Abstraction, diffuse water pollution, overly predated, not a shred of TLC and barely any fish mean I can place it no higher than bottom.

Money. It can set you back £500 for a day on the Test and double that for a season rod on the Avon. You can buy a beat on the Wye for close on a million and I doubt if that generous soul and farmer John Carrick has ever made a single bean for his fishing on the Wensum. Money. Peter Scott demanded the building of reservoirs and desalination plants to save East Anglia’s water supplies way back in 1976. Has a pound been spent on either? Money. It’s profit that drives the water companies and shreds their investment to the bone. The media have been howling about these issues since Scott’s day and little has been done. It might just take this devastating summer to give our shambles of a government the kick that it needs and force it to actually do something.