A VERY unusual fish has been caught in the River Tees near Darlington by a young angler.

Fifteen-year-old Tim Watson caught a 6lb 2oz bream at Hurworth Place a couple of weeks ago. Bream like deep, slow-moving water whereas the river near Croft Bridge is shallow and fast-flowing.

George Coulson, president of the Darlington Brown Trout Angling Association, said: "I haven't heard of anything like this before in over 60 years. The size of the fish is considerable, and you wouldn't normally expect to find bream in that location at all."

Tim, whose younger brother Nathan rushed home to Grange Avenue to collect the family camera to record the moment, said: "I was very surprised,my biggest fish before was a 1lb chubb."

Richard Jenkins, fisheries science team leader for the Environment Agency, said: "It is very unusual. We caught a bream as big as this once between Blackwell and Broken Scar in 1992.

"This fish would have been there for donkey's years - it could well be in excess of 12 or 15 years old."

Roach, dais and chubb are the most common fish to find in the River Tees along with trout and grayling. Mr Jenkins said that so far this year 1,000 sea trout have been spotted returning to the river, and a similar number of salmon has also been counted at the Tees barrage. The Tees was once a famed salmon river, but pollution killed most of them off by 1920.

"The river has got a way to go before it reaches how it was in the 1800s, but it has improved greatly since the 1950s," said Mr Jenkins. "We have plenty of indications from the fish populations that the river is in extremely good condition."

Tim returned his bream to the Tees