With all the recent rain we have experienced the rivers have
been singing their songs again, and the sound I hear is ‘The barbel are
feeding.’ Being one not to ignore such
good advice I have been out trying on a couple of different rivers with varied
success.
My first effort was a return trip to the local Tame for yet
another attempt to catch a barbel off yet another river. As always my hope is for a double figure
specimen, but initially I would be quite happy to just catch a barbel of any
size, I have not succeeded yet but I will.
This trip saw me arrive just after the river had returned inside its
banks having been well over the top and back into the surrounding fields. It does seem amazing how quickly the seagull descend
onto these new feeding grounds and the sky was full of the screaming birds of
all different varieties.
A small section of the birds in the field.
My previous two trips had been well dogged with drifting
blanket weed and this was with a low river and little flow conditions, I did
wonder what this trip would be like with that extra water rushing through. After an hour I knew the answer and the
floods had done a great job in removing most of the problem. I now had less
weed on the line than previously experienced and I could leave the bait in place
for a good 20 or 30 minutes before recasting with a fresh load of mixed hemp
and pellet in the feeder. I know the
tackle and tactics were capable of catch barbel, I havehad enough of them, but this
was not the day for success, and next time I’ll try a different swim again until I find
them.
A day on the River Severn with Merv early in the week before
the rain, saw the river very low and clear with just chub being caught despite
our best efforts. Now, with this rain the
river had come up and over the banks so I waited until the EA river levels site
gave the indication that the river would be back within the banks and fishable
again and then made plans to go. Being a Saturday I invited Curtis
along and he jumped at the chance of improving his barbel best of 9lb-5oz off
the River Teme.
9lb-5oz beauty.
We arrived mid-morning to find the river in perfect
condition for babel fishing, just inside its banks and lightly coloured as you
would expect for a river in flood. We
would both use similar tackle and tactics, these being a swimfeeder loaded with
6oz of lead used on 1.75lb test Drennan rods and 12lb main line to the usual
15lb braided hook link. The baits would
be boilies, Dynamite Shrimp and Prawn for me, and one of the Pallatrax range for
Curtis, we both would alternate with Elips pellets on a regular basis just to
see if there was any preference being shown by the fish. The feeders would be loaded with the usual
mix that I’ve used for some time now and fould it quite acceptable. I mix up different sizes of pellet and types
of pellet, and then load in drained hemp particles at a rate of about 50/50 into
the mix. The hemp holds just enough
dampness to cause the pellets to hold in the feeder without going completely in
to a soggy paste, which is not what I want.
The morning passed by without result and it was well into
the afternoon before Curtis got the first action of the day. I had been surprised at having had no fish as
the River Severn is definitely on its way back in terms of barbel being caught,
but once this fish was landed Curtis did not worry about having no previous action, he now
had a very big fish on the bank. As it
came to the net I had suggested maybe 12lb, but on the unhooking mat I adjusted
my guess to 11lb. Curtis was understandingly
very pleased with his new barbel pb at 10lb015oz, but I need to get my eyes
re-calibrated!
A new pb at 10lb-15oz
Following the action that Curtis was still celibrating I did get a couple of barbel myself, one
of 5lb and another of 6lb, I suggested we were equal on weigh but he would
not have that for some reason thinking his fish was better than mine?
My Severn average barbel with the moon over my shoulder.