Not Many Fireworks By The River

The morning of bonfire night and I had ice to scrape off the car windows for the first time this winter. With water pouring off the Moors and the Derwent rising I thought it might be a good idea to have another barbel session. I was surprised how much water was in the river when I got there. It was a good foot or more higher than I'd expected, but a rather nice peaty colour. I went to my favourite flood water swim that I'd done well in last time it was flooded. In the next swim were the only other anglers there at this time. The pair of them were pike fishing, or rather catching leaves with dead baits. The amount of sunken debris coming down was going to be a problem. Still it was now a nice sunny day.

Baits to start with were to be the flood water classics of lob worm and meat. In this case a lump of Netto's finest 15 year old Chopped Pork and Ham. Amazing what you find in the back of cupboards. The worm was to be hair rigged and dropped upstream. I'd found a 70g lead held bottom well, until the debris had piled up on the line. The meat was cut in to six large pieces and hair rigged to a size 4 hook. This went out into the middle with a 120g lead, the largest I had. Again it had to be recast regularly as the debris built up on the line.

By lunch time with nothing to show for my efforts I changed to pellet on the worm rod and a 90g feeder three quarters full of pellets. The pike anglers had given up. The debris seemed to ease off in the afternoon and the meat rod could;d stay out longer and not get dragged out of the fast water. Mid afternoon as the temperature started to drop the meat rod whacked over. I contacted with nothing, but a good half of the meat was missing. Just be fore four the pellet rod rattled a few times before lurching over. A very spirited fight from what turned out to be a fish around the 3lb mark ensued. The fast current certainly gives these smaller fish some extra spirit.

That was it for the day. I stayed just into darkness. I'm no great fan of night fishing especially on a slippy bank next to a bitterly cold flooded river.

I think there was just too much water in the river for it to fish well. one metre up seems to be the sweet spot. Still it was nice to catch the intended quarry despite the debris coming down.