2014 A review of the year.

 January.

As with last year I had a number of trips abroad organised and the first of them was a trip to Surinam in South America.  This would be my first venture to that country although I’ve been next door so to say in Guyana; this fishing would be very similar being a wild river running through quite dense jungle.  Although we would be wild camping on the bank we see very little in the way of animals etc., you hear them, but the trees are too heavy to see very far and we are too noisy trying to get close.

The main target was a catfish known as a Lau Lau by the locals and the river we fished gave an excellent chance of catching them.  That was indeed the result and numerous 100lb fish were taken with my 175lb being the largest of the trip although 200lb fish had been caught on previous trips.  The fight off the Lau Lau has to be experienced to be believed, a 50lb class boat rod bent 90 degrees for 20 or 30 minutes and you’re almost ready to pass the rod to someone else, but you don’t.

                                                             175lb Lau Lau

February.

This month gave me a very good result off the local Warwickshire Avon, conditions for barbel held near perfect for some weeks and I managed a string of good doubles with fish of 11lb-6oz 11lb-7oz and an 11lb-13oz fish that I caught a second time from a swim well downstream of its original capture. 

                                                                 11lb-6oz

                                                                      11lb-7oz

                                                             Caught twice at 11lb-13oz

Even better than this was the capture of an 6lb-5oz chub from the upper Avon, a comparatively rare event when even 5lb fish a noted as very good.

                                                            6lb-5oz Avon chub

March.

The overseas bug came on again and this month I travelled back to Guyana.  Although the countries and rivers are next door to each other the fishing is totally different.  This difference is in the range of fish in Guyana, it is very wide in scope with three or more different species where a 200lb plus fish are possible and dozens of smaller species are also available.  This adventure is at the extreme end of wild fishing, that being indicated by the fact that when we finished the fishing holiday at the furthest upstream we ventured, it took four days to get back to the hotel in the capital, Georgetown.  The holiday was a big success with all anglers catching their share of fish, my personal bests for the trip was a redtail catfish of 59lb and the largest of the jau captured at 106lb.  Piranha can be a big problem here and you can see bite marks out of the jau’s fins where the piranha attacked the fish whilst it was being played, often the damage to the fish you’re trying to land is far worse and they can be lost as the main line is bitten through as they attack.

                                                          59lb Redtail

                                                         106lb Jau.

April.

I missed out on the crucians this year, taking fish to short of 3lb on the one trip I managed before they spawned.  Good size fish can be caught post spawning but I felt that I would leave it and try for a big eel.  I did catch, though the very big fish eluded me and the best in this month was a brace one night of 4lb-2oz and 4lb-5oz, pleasing but below my target.

                                                       2lb-3oz, 4lb-2oz and 4lb-5oz.

May.

Off to Spain this month for the roach fishing.   Wells Catfish are the main target here with the large carp a close second, but I along with my companions are happy to fish for the big roach that live in both the Ebro and the Segre.  Fishing with Catmaster Tours at Mequinenza we can travel about trying different areas of both rivers and over the previous trips we have built up a list of spots that produce consistently.  This trip was no different and amongst a lot of 1lb plus fish, I took ten over the 2lb mark to a best of 2lb-10oz.  We have not had a 3lb fish yet but Pete Reading came close with a magnificent 2lb-15oz specimen.

                                                         2lb-10oz Spanish roach

                                                               Pete with a 2lb-15oz specimen

                                                                       

June.

As always I try to fish on the 16^th opening day and most times it is a disappointment, this time I caught four barbel with two over 9lb to make it a good start to the season.  Other barbel would follow, but that starting day is still worth a mention here.

I also had a few days after sturgeon a fish that fights as hard as any in our waters and a favourite of mine.  The best I took out a number of 40lb plus captures was a giant of 44lb, well pleased with that although the bigger fish in the lake still evade me until another day.

                                                            44lb sturgeon.

July.

A few barbel and eels but overall a fairly quite month with the most notable specimen being a 4lb-8oz eel.

                                                                   4lb-8oz eel.

August.

Yet again I had agreed to do the northern leg of the barbel challenge arranged by Gerry Gleeson and accomanied by Paul Floyd.  Last year was a very limited success for me with just one double off the six rivers I fished, this year was different.  Starting on the Dove I feared the worse when I blanked while the other lads caught barbel including the hoped for double to Paul.  We move every 24 hours so the next day saw us on the Derwent and this time I was smiling by the following dawn with two doubles of 11lb-12oz and 13lb-5oz, time to move again. 

                                                            13lb-5oz  Derwent

                                                           11lb-12oz  Derwent

This spell was on the nearby Trent and yet again I got a brace of doubles in a catch of seven barbel, these went 10lb and 10lb-14oz.

                                                             10lb Trent

                                                            10lb-14oz Trent

The following move saw us on the Soar and I fished a swim that was new to me though it proved a good choice when I landed eight barbel.  One of the early fish in the spell looked good but when Paul gave his comment it was at 9lb-10oz.  Later in the session my grin returned with yet another double at 10lb-11oz.

                                                                  10lb-11oz  Soar.

Now we moved across towards the Nene near Peterbough a river I had been targeting for a new river double, so far without success.  Now riding my luck I put a fish of 10lb-14oz on the scales and the local bailiff Mark Smith was delighted to take the photos for me.  He was even more delighted when Paul took the largest known fish on the stretch at 14lb for a new pb for himself.

                                                          10lb-14oz Nene pb

With five rivers down it had been agreed we would split up, Paul and Jerry going onto the southern leg while I went onto the Warwickshire Avon to try for the double off that river.  With the way things had been going for me it was almost a foregone conclusion and sure enough amongst other barbel on the session I took an immaculate 10lb-6oz specimen to end my contribution. 

                                                             10lb-6oz Wark Avon.

I had fished six rivers with a brace of doubles off two of them and a single double off another three rivers.  Add to this that the Nene double was my 24^th different river double and you can see why I was a happy lad. 

September.

I continued to catch barbel through this month and a couple of highlight were the capture of four doubles with a best of 12lb-8oz off the Trent.  This does seem to be the inform river and it will be interesting to see the results from it over the coming months. 

Coming up to yet another trip abroad I took the chance on a 200 mile round trip to the Goyt since conditions were perfect and even though it was only for the day I just felt the need to go.  That feeling proved true when I slipped my net under the 25^th river double, this one going 12lb-6oz.  Saying I was pleased just does not do the feeling justice.

                                                                     12lb-6oz Goyt pb.

                                                          12lb-8oz best of four doubles.

October.

In a year where I travelled abroad far more than usual it will come as no surprise that yet again I was overseas, this time to Canada.  As mentioned, I love sturgeon fishing so it stands to reason I would have to try the Frazer River for the monsters that live there.  I did fall ill with some bug for three days but never the less the guides looked after us and we had 21 sturgeon between us.  My best was one inch short of the five foot mark which gave an estimated weight of 110lb, each fish gave a tremendous fight and I’ll definitely be back there next year.

                                                                      110lb Sturgeon

November.

Now I was off to Spain but this time it was a two pronged attack.  Catfish and roach were the target and since it seemed the cats had been mostly caught at night it fitted in with our plans quite nicely.  One of the reasons for my trip to the Goyt just two days before the Spain trip was the severe drop in temperatures that had been forecast, sure enough just one day after we arrived there was a ten degree fall in temps and it did us no favours.  Unfortunately there were four groups of anglers for this week and only three baited swims, it worked out that we missed out on fishing the baited areas and foreseeably the cats would not move too much resulting in an almost total failure for our group to catch.  John was first on the rods and at the end of the fourth night he took his chance and landed a 214lb cat, the largest of the week.

                                                               John's 214lb cat

The roach played a little better and even though our time was limited to between 9am and 4pm we did catch a good number of fish.  I managed five over 2lb with a best of 2lb-12oz so it did save what would have been an inglorious blank week.

                                                          Best of the trip at 2lb-12oz.

                                                        Caught on the last day 2lb-9oz.

That was at the beginning of the month and was followed by three days on the bank of Chew Valley Res, unfortunately for one small jack pike.  Then the weather picked up and I decided on a trip to try for yet another new river double, this time the River Mole.  I had already been down for a single day where a local lad was good enough to show me how to access the water on the club ticket I was to use.  Unfortunately many clubs produce maps for their waters that almost defy your ability to find the water and then the access, this was such a case so a big thank you goes to that lad.  The trip was for two days, I’ll sleep in the van overnight and with the M25 to negotiate I either leave home very early or after 9am to avoid being in the traffic jam at peak times.  I decided on the 9am start and arrived about midday without too much traffic hassle.   The river, when I finally settled into my chosen swim looked perfect and I could not believe that at the very worse I would at least catch barbel off this new river, at the best one of them would be a double.  The write up of this trip comes immediately before this update to the blog so sufficient to say that over the two days I caught two doubles of 10lb-9oz and 10lb-14oz, river 26 completed!

                                                                              10lb-9oz

                                                         26th river double 10lb-14oz.

December.

December seemed to fall off a little and while I caught fish there were none of particular note.  I have highlighted some of the more noted fish and of course there are many I’ve left out.  With 21 doubles off seven different rivers I’m well pleased with the season.  Add to this there were three new river doubles among those numbers and I can increase that to very pleased.

A big advantage of my style of fishing is that there are always new horizons and targets to be met, next year will be no different and I’m already set with trips to Surinam, Canada and Spain, add in UK and there is no shortage of places and species to set my eyes on.  I hope your year has been as enjoyable as mine and I wish you all the very best for the next year.

The search for double figure barbel.

My self imposed idea of getting a double figure barbel off different rivers continues to affect my choice of venues and this time it has impelled me to return to the River Goyt at Stockport.  I’ve done a number of trips here and caught on most of them but the double has eluded my efforts, this time I hoped to correct that so that I might move on to other rivers.

 

                                                                      River's very low.

Arriving at midday I found the river to be very low, in fact the lowest I had seen it in my limited number of visits.  No problem, the barbel must still be here but those conditions can make fishing more difficult.  I had come armed for a two pronged attack, casters with hemp but backed up with a few boilies for the flyer rod which would be fished either upstream or down depending on the character of the swim.

                                                                    Successful swim

In these conditions it is easy to see how so much tackle gets lost with the river at normal height, there are pebbles going from small right up to bolder size along with other debris.   Obviously it was a case of choosing one of the pools or deep runs still left and I decided on a run not far below the weir.  Quite pacey and about 4ft deep it looked the part and just maybe it might be a route the barbel would use between the weir and pools downstream of the spot, I could only hope.

With the rods already set up for boilies I soon had the first bait sent out just upstream of my position and I then set about changing the second tackle over to suit casters.  Before I could complete that task I got a sharp knock on the baited rod and then the tip just bounced as the fish obviously moved downstream with the bait.  At this stage I assumed a chub had taken it but the strike quickly convinced me differently.  In that fast flow I had a very good fight of a barbel that would prove to be the biggest I’ve caught of this river at 9lb-5oz, A great start to the trip and it did give me a bit more confidence for the rest of the session.

 

                                                     A quick result this time.

The following hours were bit of an anti-climax in that the most exciting thing that happened was me trying to get photos of the three dippers that kept me company through the day.  These are amazing birds that can swim under water even in the fast water in this area of the river.

 

                                                                        Dipper at work.

As darkness fell I did take another two barbel of 4lb and 6lb sort of sizes and these proved to be the only barbel caught over the trip.  Disappointed?  Yes, but at the same time it was a good trip with a new river pb so maybe not that disappointed.

 

Tench, bream, barbel and eels but only one of them caught.

My poor catch returns continue, but to some degree they are self-imposed in that I choose the venues to catch a fish I want to catch rather than just catching for the sake of it.  At the moment it seems that our sport is generally at a low ebb, of course some of the thousands of anglers that have been out will catch good fish, but a tremendous number did not with me amongst them.   As the Glorious 16th approached I considered if I would have a go on the rivers, there are many to choose from and some offer a better chance of catching than others.  Probably if just catching a barbel was my criteria then I should go to the Trent, but I wanted to catch a fish that would mean something to me so I went to possibly the worse choice I could make – the River Tame at  Tamworth.

                                                 My swim on the River Tame

 

I have yet to catch a barbel off this river though I know they are there all be it in very low numbers, at least where I fish.  This season I would hope to increase the number of rivers where I’ve caught a double figure barbel from, currently at 23 rivers I am going to target four more, the Tame, Nene, Ribble and Goyt.  I could catch on the first trip to each or totally fail on all of them, but that is the challenge and the fun of my quest.  With just a few knocks off chub the first trip was the first of many blanks I shall probably experience, but the satisfaction of success should it come will be far greater than just catching another barbel for the sake of it.

My tench / bream efforts suffered another blank as well, again the choice is more for quality than quantity but even the local tench venue is not doing too well at the moment going by reports I’ve had.  Along with most of the lakes in the Colne Valley my current choice does contain the potential for very big ells and this year I will be trying to improve my 6lb-10oz pb.  With a third rod out just in front of the marginal rushes I did manage my first eel of the season, at 3lb-9oz not a monster but a start.

                                                A pointed head on a worm eating 3lb-9oz eel.

 

                                                      What's in a photograph?

 

They say a photo is worth a thousand words, and the photo above needs a few to explain just what you are looking at.  The photo is a shot of my swim on the London Lake and I’m fishing three rods, two for tench and a third for eels.  The swim itself in a bay off the main lake which is about 100 acres in extent and my thoughts were that the tench and bream might have moved in ready for spawning, if they did the eels would follow for the feast on their eggs.

The water surface is covered with willow herb seed heads, a pain in the backside in that they are very difficult to remove off your line and can in extreme conditions jam the line when trying to reel in.  A good reason to use rods with large rod rings at this time of the year, a quivertip or match rod would not survive an hour of this.  My torch can be seen hanging off the back of the rod rest, though I normally sleep with one around my neck as well ready for action in the depths of darkness.  The second torch is just in case the first fails which I’ve had happen so I cover the possibility of it happening again.  You might have noticed the catapult laying on the floor and thought this was for putting out bait, but it’s not, a closer look will show a few pebbles lying next to it.  A family of coots had found my nearby baited area with easy pickings and they were making my life difficult.  I am not worried about the little amount of food they might gather but more that I would eventually hook one of them and the ensuing problems.

The blue bowl covers my method mix and groundbait against both possible rain and little creatures that might have come during the night, the maggots tub has casters in water ready to go into the swim at regular intervals and the smaller container has hookbait for the second rod, a mix of corn, pellet and 10mm boilies so I can ring the changes over the three days I’ll be here.

The more observant of you might have noticed the two handles in the photo without apparent use, one on the right going into the reed bed and one on the left going out of picture.  These are in fact the two landing nets.  I try to avoid leaving a net where a rat or such like can get trapped in it and usually bite their way out.  This means leaving the head of it held in a nearby tree or rushes.   The net on the left is one of 50inch and its next to the eel rod,   Eels are sods that only need the tip of their tail to be outside the net and they are back out again in no time.  The other net is more like 40 inch and it is much more manageable for the smaller and more cooperative tench and bream.  Lastly the unhooking mat still folded up tells its own tale; I had blanked up to this point.    Quite a few words to cover a simple photo just imagine if I had included the camp in the shot. 

 

                                                  Holiday makers set off into the sunset.

                                   Sunset over the main lake - no photoshop just sun and cloud

Autumn Leaves and barbel.

With the forecast giving a big drop in temperatures, I decided on a trip north to try and progress my barbel river doubles target.  Currently it stands at 23 different rivers where I caught such a barbel, but why stop there?  I have already tried the River Goyt on a few occasions and have indeed caught some nice barbel from its depths, but not the double, perhaps this time it will reward my effort.

I had seen that Des Taylor would be giving a talk to the local branch of the Barbel Society so I decided I would go up to Stockport early on the Tuesday morning and fish though to about 7:00pm, then I could make my way the couple of miles to the meeting room ready for the8:00pm start.  I would stay in the van overnight ready for another try on the Wednesday and back home late that evening.

                                               The leaves show the crease line quite nicely.

My first choice of swim showed the one thing I had forgotten to allow for, it is autumn and the leaves are falling causing major disruption to any line laying in the flow of the river.  In just a few minutes the line would be clogged to the limit and a recast would be needed, worse was that it often moved the swimfeeder a this invariable found one of the many rocky snags which litter the bed of this particle venue.

I moved to a swim that had a nearside crease and slack water to give a little sanctuary from the pesky problem and it seemed this would work as within moments of my first cast I landed a small barbel.  The leaves still came into the slack but without the push of the flow they were an acceptable problem.  I had bait dropped hemp and casters as is one of my favoured methods and it seemed to have worked, but I thought too soon that my ship had come in.

                                                The first cast and first of many I hoped!

It was now mid-morning and I quickly took a small grayling to give a mixed bag so obviously fish were feeding, maybe that time had come.  It came and went just like that and the constant rebaiting and attention to detail gave me no favours with the 7:00pm deadline coming with no further action to report.

                                                  Alway a welcome fish to my net.

I arrived at the talks venue to find it well attended and Des’s talk went down very well as one would expect from such and angler.  Lots of chance to talk to local lads and friends made over previous trips, and we caught lots of barbel in the room – would the next day work its wonders, I retired for the night and that was my question as I fell asleep.

One big advantage of this period of the year is that dawn comes at a respectable time, around 7am I was making my way to the new choice of swim, again a slack but further down the river and hopefully there would be a resident big fish waiting for my bait to arrive.  I fished hard and even stayed until a bit later, but all to no avail as just one small chub took the bait and it seemed that no one on the river caught barbel – maybe next time when hopefully the leaves will all have fallen and been swept away.

                            The chub lays on a bed of leaves taken out of the slack.

New river barbel.

I think I just went through the summer and nearly missed it.  I travelled up to Stockport to fish the River Goyt on Saturday and from then until late Sunday when I returned there was NO rain and the sun shone for much of the time.  Of course as I got back towards Birmingham it started to rain again just to remind me what it looked like.

The river level was well down on that experienced recently and it was falling all the time I was there, but the fish were at least willing to have an occasional go.  My first choice of swim looked brilliant though soon after starting I realised it would probably be too shallow to give a chance in daylight.  When I began it could have been perhaps two foot but with that dropping level it would have been around one foot by the time I left.  I did not spend too long in this swim before I moved for one that would be slightly deeper, perhaps three foot or so.  The section of river I was fishing is generally quite shallow in normal summer conditions and more than four foot would be classed as a deep hole so fast shallow runs are the order of the day.  Another problem I found on the river was that of a snag ridded bottom, the river’s, not mine!  To my eye it seems that the land surrounding the river is made up of rock and sand, within the river’s course the sand has been washed away and in many areas and you are left with the rocks and pebbles that remained behind.  It was quite noticeable from my trips at the back end of last season how sandbanks and pebble strewn sections had moved in the floods, gone from one area only to appear elsewhere.  The problem was that within these rocky sections your lead or feeder would be trapped more often than not when you came to recast, a real tackle graveyard.

A pebble strewn shallow area can been seen on the far bend

    

I’ve not mentioned my tackle for some time so for the new reader of the blog here is a brief description.  As a general guide I use a pair of 1.75 12ft Drennan Power Barbel rods only going to the 2lb test model for big rivers like the Trent or Severn in flood when I might wish to use several ounces of lead to hold in the flow.  The reels are a pair of Shimano 5000’s loaded with 12lb line; I never go below this strength when barbel fishing since there seems no reason to do so and every reason not to.  I use a dual form of hook link made up of about 12 inches of 15lb Pro Gold mono to act as a stiff link and using loop to loop method [each of these tied with a figure of eight] I attach about 4 inches of 15lb Stren Powerbraid.   For the hook I use the size 8 Drennan Continental Carp and this is tied using a knotless knot to leave about a 25mm hair to take the bait.  If chub are being a real pain I would increase this hair length by 5mm or more in order to reduce the number of times the chub get hooked.  I always use the bait runner system on the reels since I would always wait for a positive take with line being stripped of the reel at pace.  The only posible change to this would be fishing next to a snag, but even then I would still prefer to sit away from the problem, then I would attempt to bring the fish out of the snag to my baited area.

                                                                        Barbel feed.

Enough of tackle, let’s get fishing.  Many times you will have read that the first order of the day is to lay the table, so after setting up the rod I bait drop perhaps 12 or more droppers of hemp and a few more drops with either broken boilies or pellets.   This trip I intended to use both so I loaded the dropper with both in order to give the fish a choice.  I have seen it said that you do not mix the baits in the swim, only using what is on the hook; I’ve not found this to be the case and will often use several different hook baits over the course of a single session and catch on two or three different offerings.  Try to keep an open mind since the playing field is forever altering.

Once this was done I could sit back and relax in the unusual sunshine beating down from above.  The water was still quite heavily coloured, looking more like weak tea than clear water so I was still confident that the barbel could be caught throughout the daylight hours, but I waited in vain.  As the light disappeared I finally got my first Goyt barbel and at 8lb-3oz it was worth waiting for.  It fell to a 10mm meaty type boilie and that accounted for two of the three barbel I caught on this trip, one of about 4lb followed this one and then another of 7lb-10oz during the following afternoon.  I also lost a fish that ran upstream and snagged on a rock just waiting for my tackle to arrive at that point.  That was it then, three barbel in 36 hours, not too bad but I’ll need to return in order to try for that double that will eventually fall to my rods.

                                                                    8lb3oz Goyt first.

                                          Second day, different swim but feeding in daylight.

Those plans and eggs.

So after nine months of walking the river banks and having success at different levels we finally came to those last few days and decisions had to be made.  I could have returned to the south, but as the last blog mentioned I had already decided not to go there.  With good barbel catches being reported in numbers off the various rivers in the area I have favoured I could have returned to the Teme or the Derwent with a fairly good chance of bagging up, even the River Severn was fishing well for the barbel, but I had made plans that way which I will come to shortly.  All this went through my mind as the dying days of the river season approached but I finally decided on a return trip to the River Goyt at Stockport.

As regular readers of my blog will have already seen I do like to vary my fishing, no matter how successful any venture might be I will quickly tire of it and move on to fresh pastures with a new challenge, perhaps to return to previous success at a later date.  My earlier one day’s fishing on the River Goyt a few weeks ago had given me the taste of the river, but not the reward, perhaps I could go one better than that and actually catch a barbel, preferably a double but in the first instance just a barbel would do.

Getting up early on the Monday morning - I would be fishing by just after 5:00am - I was soon on my way and pleased that my choice was another new challenge that if successful would complete 22 rivers where a double figure barbel had been caught.  That would be great, but we have all heard of the problem of counting chickens before they have hatched.

                                                                  Plans just waiting to hatch but will they?

I was pleased to pull up in the car-park and find myself the first to arrive, but less than five minutes later another angler who introduced himself as John Young pulled up beside me and whilst getting the tackle ready queried if I minded him fishing the next swim to my position.  No problem and we set of for the bankside together to see what the day would bring.

Setting up he advised me that he was a comparative new comer to the river and he had always fished where I had chosen as my swim but events were to give him a new perspective for any future trips he might make.  The early morning passed without any action and then at about 8:30am John got a good indication and his strike connected with a powerful fish.  Following quite a fight I slide the landing net under what was obviously a big barbel, well into doubles and I could only look with understandable envy as we prepared it for weighing and photos.  The weight came in at 13lb-3oz and later checks showed it to be the same fish that currently holds the river record at 14lb-8oz.  John was not concerned at that, it was a new personal best and then he went on to make it a really memorable day by landing another barbel of 10lb-5oz.  Meanwhile between netting his fish I blanked!

                                                               John's new pb of 13lb-3oz.

I had intended to do just the one day but with fish coming to the bank I decided at the last minute to stay over, an advantage of having the bed in the van, but the effort was wasted as the three anglers on the bank that day all blanked.  I drove back to Coventry very disappointed but determined to return next season and I will get that double off this river.

Now we arrive at the last day of the season and plans were already in place for this to be a trip to the Lower Severn after a big zander.  Again I knew my chance of a barbel would be better but I’ve caught lots of Severn barbel to over 13lb, I’ve only had one little 6lb Severn zander and would love to get one bigger.  I fished in the company of Ryan Lippet a successful young angler who I had met in the summer on the River Teme, the time passed quickly as we talked of the local fishing scene and meanwhile my indicators showed that at the very least there were fish in the swim.  With open bail-arms and Roll-Over indicators I could not have used a better system but never the less the zander would not keep hold of the bait and on over ten occasions the strike met nothing!  At close of play the frost came down along with a very heavy mist and at 8:00pm it was decided that the season was finished.

Those eggs of mine did not hatch, but that’s the nature of fishing and next week I’ll be after the bream full of ideas with eggs waiting to hatch.

Fishing in the North

I went up to Stockport to give a talk at a Barbel Society meet last Wednesday.   Very well attended with perhaps 70+ anglers who gave a warm reception.   After the talk I spoke at length to the organiser Gerry Gleeson about the local River Goyt – being the barbel record holder for that river it seemed a good move.  He was very positive and it was arranged that I would return on the Saturday to have a try at a double figure barbel off that river, a long shot but I like the challenge.

On the Thursday and Friday I had already arranged with John Monaghan to visit his local River Ribble at Preston for the two days.  Again he is the river record holder so I was in good company.  The stretch of river I fished was the same as on my previous trip but this time from the opposite bank.  There would appear to be lots of silver fish in the stretch at the moment, and the float fishermen were out in force and catching well.  Small chub, roach and bream were coming to the net in a frequency I’ve not seen for a long time. 

                                                          My swim for the first day.

Meanwhile my two legered offering of boilie and pellet were getting plenty of knocks off these small fish, but I had deliberately left a longer hair to avoid hooking them and it worked most of the time.  The chub I did hook would have been perfect as a pike bait to try for the big pike that must surely be in the area with so much fodder fish available.  With just one barbel hooked and lost to the stony river bed, despite fishing a little way into dark it were quite disappointing and the next day I moved areas to a swim perhaps a Kilometre upstream.  Deeper water and this time the swim was under my bank – the previous day the deeper channel had been on the far bank and that certainly helped cause the line to get trapped under a rock when playing the barbel.  Unfortunately the result was the same in that I did not land any barbel, this time I did not even get the chance to hook one.

                                                                   My swim for day 2.

                                                                       A couple of the snow geese that landed.

Going that 100 odd miles north did bring in a different bird life scene, a flock of oyster catchers were flying back and forth up the river with their piping call echoing all the time, occasionally the plaintive call of a curlew flying overhead would break the monotony of no bites off the fish – it is all part of being on the bankside.  A dozen or more snow geese settled on a sandy bar just up from my swim, just the little bit out of the ordinary thing that happens on the southern rivers.

That was it then, two days on the river for a number of small chub the best of which would have struggled to make two pound, I hoped for better the next day but feared the worse as the barbel fishing seemed in the dumps.  Reports off anglers on both rivers appeared to be getting the same lack of fish so I could only hope.

Dawn on Saturday saw me setting up on one of the weirs on the River Goyt, my first ever sight of that river and I would love to catch a barbel of any size, but of course the double was the target.  As with all dreams we often are met with failure and this was to prove to be such a day.  More chub were caught though of a slightly larger size the best about three pounds came to the net, but no barbel.  The day was saved by a sight I would have travelled for in its own right – a pair of dippers building a nest in under the far edge of the weir as it tumbled over the edge of the sill and left a gap at the side.  All morning these little birds, the size of a kingfisher would be travelling back and forth with material for the nest that was out of sight behind the waterfall.    As the weir water reached the bottom end of the pool it became shallower becoming a long glide perhaps only inches deep, this then went over a ridge and broken water could be seen as it tumbled along on its journey downstream.  I watched as the dippers would fly over this glide and suddenly drop out of sight into the water, not to be seen again as they worked underwater into the broken water area below.  I’ve seen on TV but now in real life it is something different again, and a memory to keep in the vaults of the mind.

    My swim on the River Goyt.

                                                         The dipper at the edge of the ripple

Plans are already in place to return to both rivers next season and the challenge will make the eventual success all the sweeter.