A Sort Of Barbel Free Barbel Session

 According to the gauges the river was still rising and should be about a yard up, so it looked like it may be a good time for another spot of barbel fishing. When I got to the river there was only a couple of cars there which was a bit of a surprise and the river wasn't quite as high as I'd expected. I also saw my first egret on this stretch. I've seen the further down, but not up here. As I got my kit out the car a couple more anglers turned up. Prospects looked good.

 

I headed downstream and plonked myself in a swim. Halibut feeder upstream and meat downstream. The upstream rod just beyond the weeds and the downstream rod in the slightly slower water midstream. The faster section being on the far bank. This was to change as the river slowly rose and the distinction slowly disappeared. A 3oz feeder held upstream, but 4oz was needed downstream. After an hour or so the upstream rod tip sprang back and I was in. Initially the fish was reasonably cooperative before it decided to head downstream. Something didn't feel right though, as if I wasn't in direct contact with the fish. The line was pointing at 45 degrees to the water but the fish had taken a lot more line and was a lot further downstream. It had clearly got under a snag. One reason I'd chosen this swim was that it was normally snag free. After a few minutes of too and fro everything went solid. I fed out some slack line and waited a good ten minutes, but it was coming out. I went for the direct pull and the line snapped with the greatest of ease. The last ten yards of the 15lb reel line was seriously chafed so of it came. I re-rigged. By now the 3oz feeder wouldn't hold bottom so I put a 4oz feeder in instead which held nicely. I'd forgotten to put the super heavy stuff in the tackle box so if things got worse it would have to be a double lead job.

Twenty minutes later the downstream rod lurched over. At first I thought it was more weed or debris on the line, but it set off downstream far far too fast for debris. Eventually i stopped the fish in it's tracks and it just hung in the current before swinging into the nearside and into some tree roots. Again I gave it so slack to no avail. I tried poking the landing net in and around the roots as this sometimes  frightens the fish out. I then went for the big heave and the 12lb hook length parted. That was to be it for me. I had expect more bites later on as this is normal ion this swim. A couple in quick(ish) succession and then nothing for a while.

The river rose around six inches while I was there. An angler I was talking to at the parking spot had taken four and lost three downstream of me. Another who'd never caught downstream of the bridge managed two, one of which was a double. Oh well. As I pondered weather to pack up as rain was expected imminently a flash of lightening and a roll of thunder made my mind up for me. I wasn't quite quick enough though. Halfway back to the car the heavens opened. By the time I got to the car it had eased off, before tipping it down again as I drove away. No fish and soggy tackle. Not a great day.

Barbel Fishing?

 Despite the recent lift in the river the reports I'd heard hadn't shown any increase in barbel coming out. In fact there hadn't been an increase in anything coming out. Talking to a couple of anglers as I wandered along the bank things hadn't been great. The river was now only a few inches up and clearing. I did start to think I should be on the other bank as I looked for a swim until I spotted one that had been a problem from the other bank. From this bank I could swing the bait under a branch to a overhanging tree. From the far bank it involved going down stream. Casting across and moving back upstream as the bank was too high to land fish opposite the overhanging tree. It also meant using a very heavy feeder as it was easy to dislodge a light feeder when moving back upstream.

 

The rigs were my usual. A blockend feeder filled with 6mm and 4mm pellets. The 4mm would drift out and the 6mm would stay in the feeder breaking up and leaving a scent trail, in theory. A 22mm pellet was on the down stream rod to the overhanging tree. On the upstream rig a 12mm pellet was used. This was dropped about six foot from the bank at the edge of the weeds. Apart from a bit of a rattle on the upstream rod nothing much happened for the first three hours.

In a rather predictable manner the down stream rod lurched over just as I was pouring boiling water into the mug for a cuppa. I have know idea what it was as it was gone by the time I'd put everything safely down. Swinging the rig back in I miss timed it a bit and wrapped the whole lot around the branch. Nothing to do but pull for a break. While I was re-rigging the upstream rod started to bounce about. This time I did connect with something that put a decent bend in the rod. A chub of 4lb 7oz. Strangely, for a chub, it had made no attempt to dive into the weeds on the inside.

I'd just got both rods back out when the downstream rod slowly bent over. I thought it was another chub initially but it soon gave up and a bream around the 2lb mark came to the surface. Just as I got it in the net the upstream rod bounced about again. This was definitely a barbel as it tore of upstream only for the hook to pull.

After a mad twenty minutes I now had time for my rather lukewarm cuppa. I had a couple more rattles on the upstream rod. One while I was watching a mouse darting about the undergrowth before it ventured out for a short while. The bream had been a bit of a surprise as I've caught very few from this river and never more than one at any time. I fished on until dark but everything went quiet. No fish topping, nothing.

 Like everybody else I wonder where the barbel have got to. It could be like the old days when the barbel rarely showed until August. We shall see as persistence pays on here.

Wavy Weeds And Lost Lambs

 I decided to give the trout a rest and head down to the river for a spot of barbel fishing. There were far more cars than expected on the verges, but most of the anglers seemed to be gathered close to the entrance so there would be plenty of space further down. From what I could gather there didn't seem to have been much barbel action but I was fishing into the evening so wasn't too worried.

After a bit of casting around in my chosen swim checking for snags I chucked in about half a pint of 4mm and 6mm halibut pellets to the downstream swim. This was to be fished with a 22mm pellet and a swimfeeder loaded with the smaller pellets. The upstream rod was the same but with a 12mm pellet. After only twenty minutes the downstream rod buckled over and I was in to what felt like a smallish fish that was quickly brought under control. A fish around the 5lb mark with a recently damaged dorsal fin.

I wasn't sure if a fish this early was a good sign or not. I continued to chuck more pellets in at intervals. Apart from a minnow that got stuck in a feeder that was it for the session. I did have a couple of rattles on the upstream rod but I suspect they were liners.

At one point a couple of lambs sated to bleat persistently and their mother would occasionally reply. Whether the the lambs expected their mother to come to them or what I don't know but eventually the did reunite.

I didn't stay until dark as the evening turned rather chilly and I'd left my fleece in the car. Apart from one all the cars parked up where different to the ones that were there when i arrived. I did see one chap make the long walk from the bottom of the stretch to retrieve a couple of fleeces from a car. I caught my target species so can't complain but I did expect there to be more action.

Fourth Day Second Session Of The 2023 River Season

 Monday's session took place on a larger deeper slower river. By deeper I mean ten foot deeper at fourteen foot. I set up two rods. One with a 5g Bolo float and the other with a big stick. The rods were fifteen foot Greys Toreon with Daiwa 120M reels. ).16mm reel line and 0.120mm hook lengths with Drennan carbon match hooks in size 16 completed the set up. For bait I'd intend to fish maggot over hemp, but had forgotten to put he hemp in the bag so loose fed maggots it was.

Things didn't get of to a flying start when the first fish turned out to be a minnow. The next fish a while later was a bleak. On the next trot down I hooked a small perch which shot up stream faster than I could wind. The big swirl as I lifted it out showed why. It was being hunted by a pike. Things then went quiet for the best part of an hour. I alternated between the big stick and the bolo. The big stick rig produced a couple of minnows.

I continued to feed but only at every other cast. I missed the next bite as I was busy watching a barn owl quartering the field opposite. I wound in to find something of a reasonable size on the end. After a bit of a spirited fight a perch of 1lb 10oz was in the net. At no point in the fight did it feel like a perch. No head shakes, just sheer speed. Things then went quiet again.

Another hour or so passed before I started to get bites on the big stick rig. For the next hour and a half there was a steady flow of fish. Dace, bleak, roach, and the occasional chublet came in. You didn't know what the next bite would be from. They were all in the same area though, roughly where I expected the loose feed to hit the river bed. It then went quiet again. As I was running low on bait I called it a day. A total of forty six fish for 5lb 8oz, although nearly a third of that weight was the big perch. You can see why match anglers often set up an inside line for the odd perch like that.

That's All Folks

 Last day of the coarse fishing season on rivers and they're all in flood. The Ouse was still rising rather quickly and after yesterday I didn't really fancy it. So the Derwent it was. I'd spent a short time yesterday evening sorting the barbel gear out and rooted around in the bait bin and fridge for some bait. I had halibut pellets and paste, garlic spam, luncheon meat, and cheese paste. I'd also gathered up a collect of 90g plus leads and similar weight feeders.

Arriving at the empty parking spot it looked like I'd have the whole section to my self. Not that I needed it as Looking at the water level I knew where I'd be fishing. There are a couple of swims I've found work in flood conditions and one of them didn't require a decent down a slippy bank. The only problem was the very cold wind blowing into my right lug 'ole. This was soon rectified by using the brolly as a windbreak. The swim had two nice creases. One upstream and the other down. In the upstream crease I plonked a 90g feeder three quarters full of halibut pellets and an 12mm one as bait. Down stream I started with a 100g lead and a gobstopper size halibut pellet. I bit of halibut putty was placed in the lead as well. My intention, if I wasn't catching, was to cycle through the hook baits on the downstream rod.

Just before lunch a couple of mink came bouncing along the far bank before vanishing into the woods. The buzzards could also be heard behind the trees. By mid-afternoon I'd cycled through the baits and was back on the big pellet and had changed to a big 120g feeder three-quarters full of smaller pellets soaked in halibut juice. On cue the rain arrived, not too heavy but cold and unpleasant none the less. After half an hour the rain had stopped but the temperature was dropping noticeably. I'd resigned my self to a third blank in a row and decided it was time to go. I brought the upstream rod in first and having sorted that out and taken the brolly down the sun came out. There was no heat in it though. As I walked up to the down stream rod the tip bent slowly over. Thinking it was more debris on the line I just started winding in. Half way back the debris moved out into the main current. 'Twas a fish. A bit more pressure and came back into the slack. As usual with barbel the moment I showed it the net it made another attempt at freedom but a bit of bullying soon had it in the net. A chubby beats of 7lb 3oz. A reasonable way to end the season I thought. I could see no point in continuing, I'd caught what I was after so mission accomplished.

I'm quite pleased with the result, it seems a reasonable way to finish. What really surprised me though, apart from the mink, was that no other anglers has shown up. Previous years when I've fished the last day here there's a few turn up mid-afternoon to tea time. Eleven days until the trout season on the rivers. So it's fluff chucking and stillwater fishing for three months.

The Roads Closed

 With the river up a foot or so I headed to an area I knew would have a few slacks. Unfortunately I'd forgotten the road was closed so I headed further downstream to an area that may have a few slacks. As it was there were very few as the river was just at that awkward height and it had coloured up far than I'd expected. I did find a few small ones that were close together so plonked myself in the middle of them so I could alternate between them.

First thing I did was drop some bits of oil soaked fish bits around the swims. I started with a small 4" rainbow trout on a paternoster rig close to the bank in the small slacks and a piece of eel injected with oil ledgered in the middle. I moved about between the swims for the best part of the day with out any sign of a fish. Before I moved I ran a lure through the swim a few times. A only had a couple of large shads with me that had been fitted with rattles.

Around three as I was making a cuppa the float bobbed about and shot away. The strike made contact with a twig. Had there been a fish or had the twig dragged the float away. It seemed a bit too fast for a twig to me. Out went another little trout. Half an hour later, just as I'd finished my cuppa, the float was away again. This time there was clearly a fish on the end. It made one half hearted run for some nearby tree roots then gave up. Once in the net it came back to life again, but settled down on the bank. A 90cm fish of 8lb 11oz with quite a few bits of damage to it. I was surprised at the weight as it really didn't look that heavy.

That was the lot for the day and given the state of the river I was quite pleased. Others out on the bank didn't seem to have fared well apart from one chap that had had a few roach and a decent perch trotting maggots.

Twig Fish Heaven

'Twas  a rather warm and sunny day today and rather nice to be sat by a river. Probably not the best conditions for pike fishing, but still. I headed for a well known pike hotspot. The problem with these places is that everybody tells me how great they are but I never seem to do well at them. Another couple of anglers were there when I arrived. They were chucking feeders about. I settled in the middle of three likely looking spots. As I setup I noticed a couple of otter prints in the mud, but more worryingly the freshly sprouted seedling of the Himalayan Balsam.

A ledgered roach was cast to the far bank and a float paternostered trout dropped alongside the dying vegetation on the nearside. The feeder chuckers seemed to be catching bits regularly. I moved the baits about every three quarters of an hour or so. After three moves I had a cuppa which did the magic. The float trundled away and I was in. Nothing big then everything went solid. Then it started moving slowly towards me, something very heavy.  Eventually a large waterlogged branch and a little jack surfaced. I managed to grab the end of the branch and pull it in. Strangely the little jack didn't move in the same direction as the branch. It had clearly come adrift and slowly sank away. Oh well, at least they were feeding. Out went another trout while I finished my cuppa.

After my cuppa I moved the paternostered trout into the slack caused by the over hanging tree. The ledgered roach was tossed out to a far bank feature. I didn't have long to wait before the dropback clunked onto the bankstick. This felt a lot bigger than the first fish and moved steadily upstream hugging the far bank. A bit more pressure and it gave up and came in like a dead weight. As it got closer to me I tried lifting it off the bottom which seemed to wake it up. It plummeted to the river bed causing a huge cloud of bubbles to rise. Everything went very heavy again. A good heave created even more bubbles. I was snagged again. Bigger and heavier then the previous branch I eventually got the seven foot monster to the surface sans fish. A bit more heave and it was on the bank.

I tried the float rig in the entrance to the side stream but only seemed to snag more, considerably smaller twigs. By lunch time I'd had enough of this and moved back to the original swim and decided to sit it out in there. Despite moving the baits about and trying others like a sardine and eel section nothing much more happened. I tried flinging a few lures about for an hour or so but this achieved nothing apart from a few more twigs. The magic hour at dusk produced nothing either. Hooked two lost two isn't the best result but it does show I must have been doing something right.

Avoiding Otto

On Wednesday it was announced that storm Otto would be making it's presence felt on Friday and it would therefore be a tad windy. I can occasional show a bit of common sense and therefore chose to fish Thursday. There was a very pikey looking swim on a local river that I'd been wanting to fish but the water levels had been too high for some time. I'd had some nice perch from the swim in the past and recently some half decent chub had come out. It was at a point in the river where it widened out and thus slowed down. The far bank had some nice over hanging trees and the near bank was lined with aquatic vegetation. I was, however, rather deep being nearly ten foot a yard from the bank and dropping to nearly sixteen foot down the middle.

 

The river was a sort of oily green colour which is it's normal colour when it's cold. I've no idea why it turns that colour but still it had never been a problem before. My intention was to fish a paternoster bait close to the near side bank and a ledgered bait under the overhanging trees. So a smelt was attached to the paternoster and a trout to the ledger and out they went. I'd already tossed a few bits of fish soaked in oil about the swim. I intended to stick it out in this swim as there was a fair bit of river and several features I could target. Every hour or so I moved the baits adding a bit of oil to them every couple of hours. My first capture came after a couple of hours when I wound in a manky old lure. The next came an hour later when I snagged a small branch on the paternoster rig. This also nicked my bait so it was replaced with a roach.

 

By mid-afternoon I was beginning to think maybe I should have moved about  through some different swims. I'd moved the paternoster about quite a bit. Changing the depth it was fished at with out so much as a sniff from a fish. The ledger rig had been under several trees with nothing to show. Just as I'd poured the hot water into the mug for a cuppa the float bobbed and sunk away. A very feisty jack of 80cm had taken the roach and proceeded to stick very close to the bank gathering various bits of vegetation around the line and itself. As I got it to the surface it shook most of the vegetation off and dived for a rather nasty snag to my right. A goodly heave kept it out and into the net in one move.

Despite staying until dark that was the only run and fish of the day. Despite catching my intended quarry I was a bit disappointed as the swim had always looked to me Iike it would hold several pike. Maybe it's not a spawning spot and they've wandered off to there.

The Angler That Went Out In The Cold

 As I didn't want to travel far, given the current weather conditions, chub fishing seemed the best idea. I made up a batch of liquidised bread and got a couple of balls of cheese paste from the freezer the night before. Unfortunately I left the paste in the garage where it proceeded to not thaw out. A quick wave of the old micros soon sorted that problem though. The car thermometer said -4 is I set off and -3 when I arrived at the river.

I had a wander about on arrival to see what swims would be accessible. A couple could be got in and out of safely so I opted for one of these. It also happens to be a swim that produces the odd very large chub, and I could get the rod rest in.  Things didn't get off to a great start when I found my two piece feeder rod was now a three piece. Thankfully the barbel rod I'd also brought was intact. Not ideal as even with the softer top it wouldn't be as sensitive as the feeder rod.

The intention was to alternate between flake and cheese paste with liquidised bread in the feeder.  After a few casts I had my first bite, a real three foot twitch. Something felt heavy on the end of the line before it all went slack. I don't know what managed to shed a size four hook, but it had. A couple of casts later a small pike shot from under the bank and took a lunge at the feeder. Somehow I managed to foul hook it somewhere amidships. It managed to shake itself free while I was reaching for the badly placed landing net. The final piece of action of the morning occurred not long after when the rod tip started to tremble. Thinking it was debris on the line I wound in to find a small, 6oz, chublet on the hook. Annoyingly it managed to flip itself off the hook as I went to lift it from the water.

After a Pot Noodle I tried a swim upstream of the one I was fishing. Fifteen minutes on flake, fifteen on paste then back to the original swim to do the same. While I was in one swim I left a little pile of liquidised bread in the other for the robins to feed on. This caused a bit of commotion at times when two or three would fly in, but never when I had the camera pointed at the bread.

By three the temperature was starting to drop. With nothing to show for my efforts I packed up at half past as it was now cold enough for gloves. Besides I didn't want to be on an icy river bank when it got dark.